It will be several years before the administration’s health care reforms take effect, and some opponents are trying to ensure that they never will.

But significant improvements are already at hand. New rules now forbid insurance companies from denying coverage to sick children, and young adults can now stay on their parents’ policies until age 26.

The federal law will bar insurers from setting a lifetime limit on benefits, and a new Maine law makes that ban effective in 2011.

According to an Associated Press summary, 200,000 to 400,000 people with pre-existing conditions could benefit from the opportunity to enroll in government-sponsored health plans in 2011. Although the cost to them is likely to be high, any safety net that is available in case of a medical disaster is reassuring.

Medicare beneficiaries are now getting better drug coverage, and the administration is promoting tax credits to help small businesses cover the cost of providing employee health insurance.

Insurers are also moving into compliance ahead of schedule, agreeing, for instance, not to seek to cancel the policies of customers diagnosed with expensive medical conditions.

And on July 1, the White House launched an online guide to health insurance at www.healthcare.gov. Based on the answers to a series of questions, the site seeks to produce the best options from the available plans. In the long run it will provide an evolving guide to consumers as the law is implemented.

Polls show rising popularity for the health reform provisions, though that could fade as employers and employees encounter higher premiums next year.

Meanwhile, more than a dozen states have filed lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the national health care law, and a federal judge began hearing Virginia’s arguments last week. The state’s attorney general claims the government should not force citizens to buy health coverage. It’s an argument that overlooks the fact that those who choose not to pay for insurance aren’t entirely out of the system. In the case of injury or serious illness, an uninsured patient can still count on treatment.

Health care reform also faces a looming political challenge: The complaint that health care reform will inevitably add to the unsustainable federal deficit. Many believe it will prove impossible for the government to establish a more efficient system than the one we are now struggling with.

That’s why a primary goal of health care reform has always been cost-reduction. Although the administration has done well to roll out benefits ahead of schedule, it must eventually demonstrate that reforms will bring down health care costs.