Tag Archives: Essential Health Benefits

With Divided Congress, Health Care Action Hightails It to the States

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.rollcall.com/news/policy/divided-congress-health-care-action-states

Image result for With Divided Congress, Health Care Action Hightails It to the States

Medicaid expansion was the biggest winner in last week’s elections.

Newly-elected leaders in the states will be in a stronger position than those in Washington to steer significant shifts in health care policy over the next couple of years as a divided Congress struggles with gridlock.

State Medicaid work requirements, prescription drug prices, insurance exchanges and short-term health plans are among the areas with the potential for substantial change. Some states with new Democratic leaders may also withdraw from a multistate lawsuit aimed at killing the 2010 health care law or look for ways to curb Trump administration policies.

But last week’s biggest health care winner is undeniably Medicaid expansion, with upwards of half a million low-income Americans poised to gain insurance coverage following successful expansion ballot initiatives and Democratic victories in key governors’ races.

“In state health policy, it was a big election,” said Trish Riley, executive director of the nonpartisan National Academy for State Health Policy. “It was a year when many candidates had pretty thoughtful and comprehensive proposals.”

Boost for Medicaid expansion

Voters in three deep-red states — Nebraska, Idaho and Utah — bucked their Republican lawmakers by approving ballot initiatives to extend Medicaid coverage to more than 300,000 people.

Meanwhile, Democratic gubernatorial wins in Kansas and Wisconsin boosted the chances of expansion in those states. And Maine’s new governor-elect is expected to act quickly to grow the government insurance program when she takes office in January.

The election outcomes could bring the biggest increase in enrollment since an initial burst of more than two dozen states expanded Medicaid under the 2010 health care law in the early years of the landmark law’s rollout.

“This election proves that politicians who fought to repeal the Affordable Care Act got it wrong,” said Jonathan Schleifer, head of The Fairness Project, an advocacy group that supported the initiatives, referring to the 2010 health care law. “Americans want to live in a country where everyone can go to the doctor without going bankrupt.”

The successful ballot initiatives require state leaders to move quickly toward expansion. In Idaho, the state must submit an expansion plan to federal officials within 90 days of the new law’s approval, while Nebraska must submit its plan by April 1, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. Utah’s new law also calls for the state to expand beginning April 1.

In Kansas, where Medicaid supporter Laura Kelly prevailed, state lawmakers passed expansion legislation last year only to have it vetoed by the governor. Meanwhile, Wisconsin’s new Democratic governor Tony Evers, who eked out a win over Republican incumbent Scott Walker, has said he will “take immediate action” to expand, though he faces opposition from a Republican-controlled legislature.

Expansions in the five states would bring the number of states that adopted expansion under the health law to 38, plus the District of Columbia.

Still, Democrats fell short of taking one of the biggest Medicaid expansion prizes — Florida — after Andrew Gillum’s defeat. The outcome of Georgia’s tight governor’s race was still unclear as of Monday, with Republican Brian Kemp holding a narrow lead over Democrat Stacey Abrams. Both Abrams and Gillum made health care, and Medicaid expansion in particular, central to their campaigns.

Florida might be a 2020 target for an expansion ballot initiative, along with other states such as Missouri and Oklahoma, according to The Fairness Project.

Expansion supporters also suffered defeat last week in Montana, where voters did not approve a ballot initiative that would have extended the state’s existing Medicaid expansion, which covers nearly 100,000 people but is slated to expire next year. However, state lawmakers have until June 30 to reauthorize the program, according to Kaiser.

In Maine, Democratic gubernatorial winner Janet Mills is expected to expedite expansion implementation. GOP Gov. Paul LePage stymied implementation over the past year, despite nearly 60 percent of voters approving an expansion ballot initiative in 2017.

Medicaid’s future

The midterm results carry other ramifications for Medicaid, including whether states embrace or move away from controversial work requirements backed by the Trump administration.

Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat who won Michigan’s governor race, opposed the idea and could shift away from an existing plan to institute them that’s awaiting federal approval.

“This so-called work requirement is not for one second about getting people back to work. If it was, it would have been focused on leveling barriers to employment like opening up training for skills or giving people child care options or transportation options,” Whitmer said in a September interview with Michigan Radio. “It was about taking health care away from people.”

Kansas, Wisconsin and Maine also have work requirement proposals that new Democratic governors could reverse.

But experts also say it’s possible some states, including those with Democratic governors, could end up pursuing Medicaid work requirements if that’s what it takes to get conservative legislators to accept expansion like Virginia did earlier this year.

Nebraska Republican state senator John McCollister, who supports expansion, predicted recently that the legislature would fund the voter-approved expansion initiative. But he indicated lawmakers might pursue Medicaid work requirements too.

Marie Fishpaw, director of domestic policy studies at the conservative Heritage Foundation, warned that states expanding Medicaid would face challenges. She called expansion “a poor instrument for achieving the goal that they’re trying to achieve.”

A number of new governors, including Whitmer, could pursue the so-called “Medicaid buy-in” concept.

More than a dozen state legislatures, such as in Minnesota and Iowa, explored the idea in recent years, according to State Health and Value Strategies, part of the nonprofit Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Nevada lawmakers passed a “Medicaid buy-in” plan last year that was vetoed by the governor.

There are a variety of ways to implement such a program, but the goal is to expand health care access by leveraging the government insurance program, such as by creating a state-sponsored public health plan option on the insurance exchanges that consumers could buy that relies on Medicaid provider networks. Illinois, New Mexico, Maine and Connecticut are among the states that could pursue buy-in programs, Riley said. States are considering the concept as a way to increase affordability and lower cost growth by getting more mileage out of the lower provider rates Medicaid pays, said Katherine Hempstead, a senior policy adviser with Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

“So many [people] struggle with the affordability of health care,” Hempstead said. “That is an environment in which Medicaid buy-in opportunities could flourish.”

Health care law

This month’s election also carries implications for the future of states’ administration of the 2010 health care law.

States that flipped to Democratic governors could switch to creating their own insurance exchanges rather than relying on the federal marketplace, said Joel Ario, a health care consultant with Manatt Phelps & Phillips and the former head of the federal health insurance exchange office under the Obama administration. The costs of running an exchange have come down in recent years, so it’s potentially cheaper for a state to run its own, Ario said.

Trump administration actions, such as cuts in federal funding for insurance navigators that help consumers enroll and the expansion of health plans that don’t comply with the law, may make states such as Michigan or Wisconsin rethink use of the federal exchange, he said.

“If [the administration] continues to promote policies that really leave a bad taste in the mouth for Democratic governors, I think they’ll be asking questions,” Ario said.

States where governors and attorneys general offices went from red to blue are likely to pull out of a lawsuit by 20 state officials that aims to take down the health care law, he added.

Wisconsin’s Evers vowed that his first act in office will be to withdraw from the lawsuit.

“I know that the approximately 2.4 million Wisconsinites with a pre-existing condition share my deep concern that this litigation jeopardizes their access to quality and affordable health care,” Evers wrote in a letter he said he plans to send to the state attorney general.

Hempstead said that states with both Republican and Democratic leaders will likely continue to pursue reinsurance programs, which cover high-cost patients, to bolster their marketplaces.

Republican governors could also pursue waivers under a recent Trump administration guidance that allows states to circumvent some requirements of the health law under exemptions known as 1332 waivers. But experts say it’s too soon to know exactly what approaches states might take.

“It will be interesting to see what the 1332 guidance means and whether it opens doors for some things and not for others,” Hempstead said. States that shifted to Democratic governors could also look to ban some Trump-supported policies, such as expansions of short-term and association health plans that avoid the health care law’s rules.

States are also likely to take steps to address high prescription drug costs in the coming years, with a number of new governors wanting to improve transparency, explore drug importation from other countries and target price gouging, Riley said.

“There’s a long history of the states testing, fixing, tweaking and informing the national debate,” said Riley.

 

FTC: Florida company made $100M selling fake insurance

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/legal-regulatory-issues/ftc-florida-company-made-100m-selling-fake-insurance.html

Image result for skinny health plans

A federal judge has temporarily shut down Miami-based Simple Health Plans at the request of the Federal Trade Commission.

In a federal complaint against Simple Health Plans, the company’s owner and five other entities, the FTC alleges Simple Health Plans collected more than $100 million by selling worthless health plans to thousands of people. The company allegedly misled consumers to think they were buying comprehensive “PPO” health insurance plans when they were actually purchasing plans that provided no coverage for pre-existing conditions or prescription medications.

Many of the people who purchased plans from Simple Health Plans are facing hefty medical bills for expenses they assumed would be covered by their health insurance plan. In addition, because the limited health plans do not qualify as health insurance under the ACA, some people were subject to a fee imposed on those who can afford to buy health insurance but choose not to.

The FTC is seeking to permanently shut down Simple Health Plans and to have the company return money to consumers.

 

 

Pre-existing conditions: Does any GOP proposal match the ACA?

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2018/oct/17/pre-existing-conditions-does-any-gop-proposal-matc/?fbclid=IwAR2QXSwiwRryxaHWJVgO3evTUtJPk6QcV1HkxkaI2qq3iPWqsrXqGA0qPeY

From a routine visit to a critical exam, the stethoscope remains one of the most common physician tools. (Alex Proimos, via Flickr Creative Commons)

In race after race, Democrats have been pummeling Republicans on the most popular piece of Obamacare, protections for pre-existing conditions. No matter how sick someone might be, today’s law says insurance companies must cover them.

Republican efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare have all aimed to retain the guarantee that past health would be no bar to new coverage.

Democrats aren’t buying it.

In campaign ads in Nevada, Indiana, Florida, North Dakota, and more, Democrats charged their opponents with either nixing guaranteed coverage outright or putting those with pre-existing conditions at risk. The claims might exaggerate, but they all have had a dose of truth.

Republican proposals are not as air tight as Obamacare.

We’ll walk you through why.

The current guarantee

In the old days, insurance companies had ways to avoid selling policies to people who were likely to cost more than insurers wanted to spend. They might deny them coverage outright, or exclude coverage for a known condition, or charge so much that insurance became unaffordable.

The Affordable Care Act boxes out the old insurance practices with a package of legal moves. First, it says point-blank that carriers “may not impose any preexisting condition exclusion.” It backs that up with another section that says they “may not establish rules for eligibility” based on health status, medical condition, claims experience or medical history.

Those two provisions apply to all plans. The third –– community rating –– targets insurance sold to individuals and small groups (about 7 percent of the total) and limits the factors that go into setting prices. In particular, while insurers can charge older people more, they can’t charge them more than three times what they charge a 21-year-old policy holder.

Wrapped around all that is a fourth measure that lists the essential health benefits that every plan, except grandfathered ones, must offer. A trip to the emergency room, surgery, maternity care and more all fall under this provision. This prevents insurers from discouraging people who might need expensive services by crafting plans that don’t offer them.

At rally after rally for Republicans, President Donald Trump has been telling voters “pre-existing conditions will always be taken care of by us.” At an event in Mississippi, he faulted Democrats, saying, “they have no plan,” which ignores that Democrats already voted for the Obamacare guarantees.

At different times last year, Trump voiced support for Republican bills to replace Obamacare. The White House said the House’s American Health Care Act “protects the most vulnerable Americans, including those with pre-existing conditions.” A fact sheet cited $120 billion for states to keep plans affordable, along with other facets in the bill.

But the protections in the GOP plans are not as strong as Obamacare. One independent analysis found that the bill left over 6 million people exposed to much higher premiums for at least one year. We’ll get to the congressional action next, but as things stand, the latest official move by the administration has been to agree that the guarantees in the Affordable Care Act should go. It said that in a Texas lawsuit tied to the individual mandate.

The individual mandate is the evil twin of guaranteed coverage. If companies were forced to cover everyone, the government would force everyone (with some exceptions) to have insurance, in order to balance out the sick with the healthy. In the 2017 tax cut law, Congress zeroed out the penalty for not having coverage. A few months later, a group of 20 states looked at that change and sued to overturn the entire law.

In particular, they argued that with a toothless mandate, the judge should terminate protections for pre-existing conditions.

The U.S. Justice Department agreed, writing in its filing “the individual mandate is not severable from the ACA’s guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements.”

So, if the mandate goes, so does guaranteed-issue.

The judge has yet to rule.

Latest Republican plan has holes

In August, a group of 10 Republican senators introduced a bill with a title designed to neutralize criticism that Republicans don’t care about this issue. It’s called Ensuring Coverage for Patients with Pre-Existing Conditions. (A House Republican later introduced a similar bill.)

The legislation borrows words directly from the Affordable Care Act, saying insurers “may not establish rules for eligibility” based on health status, medical condition, claims experience or medical history.

But there’s an out.

The bill adds an option for companies to deny certain coverage if “it will not have the capacity to deliver services adequately.”

To Allison Hoffman, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, that’s a big loophole.

“Insurers could exclude someone’s preexisting conditions from coverage, even if they offered her a policy,” Hoffman said. “That fact alone sinks any claims that this law offers pre-existing condition protection.”

The limit here is that insurers must apply such a rule across the board to every employer and individual plan. They couldn’t cherry pick.

But the bill also gives companies broad leeway in setting premiums. While they can’t set rates based on health status, there’s no limit on how much premiums could vary based on other factors.

The Affordable Care Act had an outside limit of 3 to 1 based on age. That’s not in this bill. And Hoffman told us the flexibility doesn’t stop there.

“They could charge people in less healthy communities or occupations way more than others,” Hoffman said. “Just guaranteeing that everyone can get a policy has no meaning if the premiums are unaffordable for people more likely to need medical care.”

Rodney Whitlock, a health policy expert who worked for Republicans in Congress, told us those criticisms are valid.

“Insurers will use the rules available to them to take in more in premiums than they pay out in claims,” Whitlock said. “If you see a loophole and think insurers will use it, that’s probably true.”

Past Republican plans also had holes

Whitlock said more broadly that Republicans have struggled at every point to say they are providing the same level of protection as in the Affordable Care Act.

“And they are not,” Whitlock said. “It is 100 percent true that Republicans are not meeting the Affordable Care Act standard. And they are not trying to.”

The House American Health Care Act and the Senate Better Care Reconciliation Act allowed premiums to vary five fold, compared to the three fold limit in the Affordable Care Act. Both bills, and then later the Graham-Cassidy bill, included waivers or block grants that offered states wide latitude over rates.

Graham-Cassidy also gave states leeway to redefine the core benefits that every plan had to provide. Health law professor Wendy Netter Epstein at DePaul University said that could play out badly.

“It means that insurers could sell very bare-bones plans with low premiums that will be attractive to healthy people, and then the plans that provide the coverage that sicker people need will become very expensive,” Epstein said.

Insurance is always about sharing risk. Whether through premiums or taxes, healthy people cover the costs of taking care of sick people. Right now, Whitlock said, the political process is doing a poor job of resolving how that applies to the people most likely to need care.

“The Affordable Care Act set up a system where people without pre-existing conditions pay more to protect people who have them,” Whitlock said. “Somewhere between the Affordable Care Act standard and no protections at all is a legitimate debate about the right tradeoff. We are not engaged in that debate.”

 

 

The ACA Protects People with Preexisting Conditions; Proposed Replacements Would Not

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2018/aca-protects-people-preexisting-conditions-proposed-replacements-would-not?omnicid=EALERT%%jobid%%&mid=%%emailaddr%%

Patient with preexisting condition

The Affordable Care Act’s health insurance marketplaces open for enrollment today for the sixth time. But this year the marketplace health plans in many states will face some new competition from insurance products that don’t meet the law’s standards, including the ban on denying coverage or charging more based on a person’s preexisting health conditions.

New Trump administration regulations released earlier this year have undermined the coverage protections in the ACA by making it possible for insurers to renew often skimpy short-term health insurance for up to three years, and for small businesses to form associations that sell substandard health plans. One of the reasons insurers can charge low premiums for these plans is that they generally cover less that ACA-compliant plans and insurers can deny them to people with diabetes or a history of cancer, for example. Only healthy people get these plans. And the more healthy people who buy them, the more expensive coverage becomes for people with a history of illness who buy their own insurance and have incomes too high to qualify for marketplace subsidies. In guidance released last week, the administration will allow states to further encourage the sale of these plans by letting people use federal subsidies to buy them.

As a nation, it is important for us to focus our energy on ways to improve people’s health. We are experiencing an unprecedented decline in life expectancy which will ultimately affect our economic health and the ability of Americans to compete in a global workforce. One of the most basic things we can do is preserve the coverage protections for people with health problems that have been law for more than four years, rather than poke holes in them. Americans say they support this idea. Recent polls have found that majorities of Americans believe that people with health conditions should not be denied affordable health insurance and health care. As a result, House and Senate candidates of both parties are running on their support for protecting coverage for people with preexisting conditions. But some of those very candidates voted to repeal the ACA last year.

The ACA has dramatically improved the ability of people with preexisting conditions to buy coverage. In 2010, before the law passed, we conducted a survey that found 70 percent of people with health problems said it was very difficult or impossible to buy affordable coverage, and just 36 percent said they ended up purchasing a health plan. By 2016, the percentage of people who had trouble buying an affordable plan had dropped down to 42 percent — still high but much improved — and 60 percent ultimately bought a plan.

While the congressional ACA repeal bills failed last year, a Republican Congress could try again next year. And in the meantime, the law’s preexisting conditions protections and other provisions face another threat from a lawsuit brought by Republican governors and attorneys general in 20 states. The U.S Department of Justice has agreed with the plaintiff states in part, and refused to defend the law’s preexisting condition protections. The court decision is pending. Should the states win, an estimated 17 million people could become uninsured.

Some congressional candidates from these states and others are pointing to their support for Republican proposals, such as the “Ensuring Coverage for Patients with Pre-Existing Conditions Act,” as proof they support coverage for preexisting conditions. This bill would prevent insurers from refusing or varying premiums based on preexisting conditions. But, unlike the ACA, this bill would allow insurers to sell plans that entirely exclude coverage for care pertaining to the preexisting conditions themselves. The reality is that this bill would not protect sick Americans, or those who may become ill in the future, from high out-of-pocket health care costs.

Several million people will be going to the marketplaces in the next few weeks to sign up for coverage since they do not have it through an employer. At this time, not one of them who buys a plan in the marketplace has to fear that an insurance company will deny them coverage or charge them a higher premium because of their health. The efforts to undermine the individual market and invalidate the ACA’s consumer protections are real-life threats for people who depend on this insurance for their health care. The nation cannot move forward with tackling our most pressing health care problems if we continue to debate a core protection of the ACA that most Americans support.

 

 

Covered CA enrollment expected to drop as penalty ends

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.modbee.com/living/health-fitness/article220347880.html

Image result for Covered CA enrollment expected to drop as penalty ends

Covered California’s fall enrollment period will show whether peace of mind is a motivation for people to keep their health insurance next year.

Last year, Congress passed legislation that in 2019 erases the federal tax penalty for people without coverage.

Without the threat of a penalty, Covered California, the state’s health exchange, estimates that 12 percent of its customers, or 162,000 residents, will leave the program and an additional 100,000 who purchase insurance from brokers in the state will discontinue coverage.

Affordable Care Act supporters believe there are sound reasons for the 1.4 million consumers in the program to stay insured — to protect themselves against crushing medical bills at rates subsidized by the federal government.

Almost 70,000 residents in a five-county pricing region, including Stanislaus, San Joaquin, Merced, Mariposa and Tulare counties, are covered on the exchange and 95 percent of them receive help with monthly premiums. About 18,000 are covered in Stanislaus County.

“Certainly it’s possible some will roll the dice and decide to go without coverage,” James Scullary, a Covered California spokesman, said Friday. “People generally want health insurance. They want to have that peace of mind of coverage in case of an injury or illness.”

The anticipated departure of some consumers from the pool accounts for part of an 8.7 percent average rate increase next year for Obamacare plans offered by 11 insurers in California. On average, those insurers tacked an extra 3.5 percent onto next year’s rates due to projected costs of serving a smaller, less healthy customer base when the tax penalty ends.

Individuals and families whose premiums are subsidized will see small increases because higher premiums are triggers for larger federal tax credits. It will serve to pass $250 million in additional costs to the federal government. Individuals earning between $16,754 and $48,560 a year are eligible for subsidized rates and the same applies to a family of four with income between $34,638 and $100,400 a year.

Those not eligible for subsidies will be stung by the rate increases, projected at almost 7 percent in the five-county region. A state bill to help middle-income households buy costly insurance on the individual market failed to pass this year.

The enrollment period for 2019 opened last week and runs through Jan. 15. The enrollment deadline is Dec. 15 for coverage to take effect Jan. 1.

A 40-year-old adult earning $35,000 a year can purchase a standard Silver plan for monthly costs ranging from $187 to $376, according to Covered California’s “shop and compare” online tool. Anthem Blue Cross, Kaiser Permanente, Blue Shield of California and HealthNet are the four insurance carriers offering the metal tier plans (Bronze to Platinum) in this region.

For a family of four with annual income of $62,500, monthly costs for Silver coverage will range from $254 to $625, depending on what plan is chosen. In that scenario, the two children may be eligible for free or low-cost care through the Medi-Cal program and the parents could receive extra help for co-payments.

Some residents not eligible for subsidies settle for the skimpy Bronze coverage through Covered California. A 55-year-old with $60,000 annual income will pay from $535 to $821 a month for Bronze plans next year. The cheapest Bronze HMO requires 40 percent co-pays for primary care visits and generic drugs; the annual out-of-pocket maximum is $6,000.

Citing data from Covered California’s consumer pool, Scullary said that 1.2 million customers have needed some health care and 153,000 have been protected from claims ranging from $5,000 to $50,000. Scullary said 15,000 consumers were shielded from health care costs over $50,000 and 42 people had claims in excess of $1 million.

The state exchange will promote enrollment this fall through an advertising campaign and a bus tour beginning after the November election, the spokesman said. The agency has local partners and certified brokers across the state to assist consumers with choosing suitable plans.

Covered California has a Monday-to-Saturday customer service line at 800-300-1506. Enrollment information is available at www.coveredca.com.

 

 

 

What’s at Stake for Health Care in Your District This Midterm Election?

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

What’s at Stake for Health Care in Your District This Midterm Election?

Image result for What’s at Stake for Health Care in Mid Term Elections

 

On November 6, 2018, Californians will head to the polls to vote for who will represent them in Congress. The outcome of races could have significant implications for health care in California and nationwide. Major policies at stake include the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the Medicaid program (called Medi-Cal in California), and protections for those with preexisting conditions.

What’s at stake for California?

  • 1.4 million Californians purchase coverage through Covered California, the health insurance marketplace established under the ACA. Close to 90% receive federal subsidies to help them afford their premiums.
  • 13.5 million Californians are covered by Medi-Cal.
  • 6.7 million Californians would have lost coverage by 2027 if the last attempt by Congress to repeal the ACA and cut Medicaid (through a proposal called Graham-Cassidy) had passed. It is widely anticipated that a future attempt to repeal the ACA would be modeled after Graham-Cassidy.
  • 550,000 fewer jobs would have been created in California by 2027 if Graham-Cassidy had passed.
  • 16.7 million nonelderly Californians are estimated to live with a preexisting condition.

What’s at stake in your district?

 

Repeal of ACA on Republican agenda after midterms

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/repeal-aca-republican-agenda-after-midterms?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTldNeU1qQmpOMk14WXpRMyIsInQiOiJDSlRcL25VMHRkNTlLQzZqU1dERHJzWnFlUmR2MCtJcWNaT0VZVUprSWY4ejJ2a1ZlemRaZStIaVA4bWRIM3h6VlphdWJreDRwK1cwbjhNWnZ0WmFCeVQ3b2lTSTQ5Y1krdHFKQTdCQ1dPRDd2a1NOVDFBTG5ESWpNUnhQYzVvdWwifQ%3D%3D

Related image

Repeal would end the ACA’s most popular provision, to cover those with preexisting conditions.

Republicans could try again to repeal the Affordable Care Act if they win enough seats in the midterm election this November, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said on Wednesday, according to Reuters.

WHY THIS MATTERS

Providers want to keep the ACA to minimize the cost of uncompensated care from treating individuals who have no insurance.

Insurers this year have turned around earlier losses and exits, expanding their footprint in the market and, in many cases, offering lowering premium rates for 2019.

Studies show most consumers like the ACA but remain confused about the healthcare law, with close to 80 percent unaware that open enrollment starts on November 1.

THE TREND

Republicans last year tried and failed to repeal the ACA. In another attempt to get rid of the individual and employer mandates for coverage, the GOP this summer introduced the “skinny” repeal in the Health Care Freedom Act.

On July 28, Senator John McCain cast the deciding vote when he joined two other Republican senators in voting down the skinny repeal of the ACA that the Congressional Budget Office said could result in 16 million more people becoming uninsured. Provider groups such as America’s Essential Hospitals and the American Medical Association, voiced their approval that the skinny repeal failed.

Republicans got rid of the individual and employer mandates in this year’s budget bill.

The Trump Administration also introduced a less expensive alternative to ACA plans in allowing consumers to buy short-term limited duration plans that offer coverage for up to a year and can be extended for three years. The short-term plans are not mandated by law, as are ACA plans, to cover pre-existing conditions and offer essential benefits.

THEIR TAKE

Republicans have long promised to end the ACA because they say it’s not working.

OUR TAKE

Republicans have been chipping away at Obamacare and the government has drastically cut funds to promote it, but at the same time, the Department of Health and Human Services has helped to stabilize the market. Most significantly, it has allowed insurers to silver load plans to apply full premium increases to silver plans in the ACA to make up for the loss of cost-sharing reduction payments that were eliminated by President Trump. Since nine out of 10 consumers get tax subsidies for buying plans, this move was essentially subsidized by the federal government.

Even if the GOP retains its majority this November, repeal of the ACA will be an uphill battle. It would end the ACA’s most popular provision to cover those with preexisting conditions.

President Trump tweeted on Friday his support of protecting those who have preexisting conditioins saying. “All Republicans support people with pre-existing conditions, and if they don’t, they will after I speak to them. I am in total support. Also, Democrats will destroy your Medicare, and I will keep it healthy and well!”

 

 

 

CMS announces new waiver flexibility in ACA market

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/cms-announces-new-waiver-flexibility-aca-market?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTldNeU1qQmpOMk14WXpRMyIsInQiOiJDSlRcL25VMHRkNTlLQzZqU1dERHJzWnFlUmR2MCtJcWNaT0VZVUprSWY4ejJ2a1ZlemRaZStIaVA4bWRIM3h6VlphdWJreDRwK1cwbjhNWnZ0WmFCeVQ3b2lTSTQ5Y1krdHFKQTdCQ1dPRDd2a1NOVDFBTG5ESWpNUnhQYzVvdWwifQ%3D%3D

 

States will have the ability to allow individuals to use ACA subsidies when buying short-term limited duration plans.

States are getting new flexibility in waivers to the Affordable Care Act, including being able to target ACA subsidies for individuals who want to buy short-term, limited duration plans, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma said today.

What is not flexible is protecting access to coverage to those with pre-existing conditions.

Verma gave no specifics on the types of waivers that will be considered, but said the agency was preparing to release a series of waiver concepts. More specifics are expected to be released in the coming weeks.

The policy goes into effect today but is expected to impact states next year, for the 2020 plan year.

IMPACT

The effect of the waivers will likely not be known until next year.

But the allowance of short-term insurance as an ACA alternative could have a more immediate effect as consumers choose plans during open enrollment starting November 1.

The Trump Administration this year extended the length of short-term plans from three months to one year, with an extension allowed for up to three years. Because these plans would not be obligated to cover the essential benefits mandated under the ACA, premiums are expected to be lower.

Opponents have said this would cause an exodus of healthy consumers from the traditional ACA market and rising prices for those left behind.

THE TREND

CMS has been taking credit for stabilizing the ACA market and lowering premiums through the use of waivers and by easing regulations.

For instance, reinsurance waivers have helped reduce premium costs, CMS said. To date, CMS has approved eight state waivers, and all but one have been a reinsurance waiver for states to develop high-risk pools to help pay the cost of high claims.

The reason for the lack of other approved waivers is due to the previous Administration limiting the types of state waiver proposals that the government would approve, CMS said.

The new Section 1332 waivers, called state relief and empowerment waivers, will allow states to “get out from under onerous rules of Obamacare,” Verma said.

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW

Under Section 1332 of the ACA, states can waive certain provisions of the law as long as the new state waiver plan meets specific criteria, or “guardrails,” that help guarantee people retain access to coverage that is at least as comprehensive and affordable as without the waiver; covers as many individuals; and is deficit neutral to the federal government.

The new waivers should aim to provide increased access to affordable private market coverage; encourage sustainable spending growth; foster state innovation; support and empower those in need; and promote consumer-driven healthcare, CMS said.

ON THE RECORD

“Now, states will have a clearer sense of how they can take the lead on making available more insurance options, within the bounds of the Affordable Care Act, that are fiscally sustainable, private sector-driven, and consumer-friendly,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.

“The Trump Administration inherited a health insurance market with skyrocketing premiums and dwindling choices,” said CMS Administrator Seema Verma. “Under the president’s leadership, the Administration recently announced average premiums will decline on the federal exchange for the first time and more insurers will return to offer increased choices.

“But our work isn’t done. Premiums are still much too high and choice is still too limited. This is a new day — this is a new approach to empower states to provide relief. States know much better than the federal government how their markets work. With today’s announcement, we are making sure that they have the ability to adopt innovative strategies to reduce costs for Americans, while providing higher quality options.”

 

Why the new ACA waivers matter

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-vitals-0c7471b2-4434-433d-95c2-929297dedf3c.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosvitals&stream=top

 

As in-the-weeds as a revised waiver process sounds, the practical effects of what the Trump administration announced yesterday could add up to one of its most substantive blows yet against the Affordable Care Act.

The big picture: These changes will likely cause more separation of healthy and sick people, but only in states that avail themselves of these new options — creating another level of segmentation between red and blue states.

How it works: Under the Obama administration, states seeking a waiver from the ACA’s rules had to show that their alternatives would cover just as many people as the ACA, with insurance that’s just as robust, for the same cost. That’s why only 8 waivers have ever been granted.

  • But under the Trump administration’s approach, if the same number of people have access to ACA-level coverage, that’ll count — even if few of them actually choose it.
  • Likewise, “a waiver that makes coverage much more affordable for some people and only slightly more costly for a larger number of people would likely meet” the new standards, the formal policy guidance says.
  • States could, for example, seek a waiver that would let their residents apply the ACA’s premium subsidies to “short-term” insurance plans, even though those plans don’t meet the ACA’s requirements, including the mandate to cover people with pre-existing conditions.

Between the lines: The Trump administration has often treated the ACA’s exchanges as a de facto high-risk pool. And that’s the best prism through which to understand these latest changes.

  • These waivers will let states lean even further into new, non-ACA options for healthy people. That will likely increase premiums for ACA coverage. But because the vast majority of ACA enrollees are subsidized, they’ll be insulated from those costs.

There are limits to how far that dynamic can go, because states’ waivers still can’t add too much to the federal government’s costs. But that’s the basic dynamic at play here — and it’s one that will continue to move the larger individual market further and further away from the ACA.

 

Dinged, Dented, Defiant: The ACA Is Still Standing

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.healthleadersmedia.com/dinged-dented-defiant-aca-still-standing

Texas v. Azar is the latest in a long line of lawsuits and legislation that Republicans have used to undermine the Affordable Care Act, which has shown itself to be remarkably resilient.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

A federal judge in Texas could slap a preliminary injunction on the ACA.

The case is the latest in a long string of efforts to dismantle the ACA since its inception in 2010.

A federal judge in Texas is poised to drop a ruling that could determine the future of the Affordable Care Act.

Or, maybe not.

The Republican plaintiffs from 20 states in Texas v. Azar argued before U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in early September that the entire ACA became unconstitutional when Congress zeroed out the individual mandate penalty, effective 2019.

Led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Republican plaintiffs are asking for a preliminary injunction. The Department of Justice, which declined to defend portions of the ACA, also urged O’Conner to delay any injunction until after the enrollment period, saying any attempts to impose the injunction during the enrollment period would invite “chaos.”

If the injunction goes through, it could end premium subsidies for ACA beneficiaries and cripple enrollment. The Urban Institute has estimated that 17 million people would lose their health insurance coverage if the ACA was overturned.

As potentially catastrophic as this sounds, the healthcare sector doesn’t seem to be overly concerned. In fact, business couldn’t be better.

A report in Axios shows that many players in the healthcare sector are prospering under the ACA. The website notes that S&P 500 healthcare index of 63 major companies has grown by 186% since the ACA became law in 2010, outstripping the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones.

In addition, health insurance companies are flush. Shares of UnitedHealth Group have gone up more than 700% since 2010, and the stock price of ACA marketplace insurer Centene has gone up 1,100% over the same period, Axios reports.

While hospitals have had a tougher time of it, especially in states that refused to expand Medicaid, they’re still seeing reductions in charity care and bad debt owing.

Regardless of how O’Connor rules in Texas v. Azar, ACA payers, providers, and other stakeholders will continue to presume that the law isn’t going anywhere, says healthcare economist Gail Wilensky.

“They’re assuming it’ll be around, or something very similar will be,” says Wilensky, a former director of Medicare and Medicaid, and a former chair of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission.

“I don’t think people are regarding any serious likelihood of it going away again,” she says.

Even if O’Connor, appointed to the court in 2007 by President George W. Bush, agrees with the severability arguments raised by the Republican governors and attorneys general in 20 states who brought the suit, the matter likely would get shot down on appeal, Wilensky says.

” I would be surprised if it doesn’t get reversed someplace else,” says Wilensky, now a senior fellow at Project HOPE.

“If it had go all the way to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court isn’t going to tolerate it, but I don’t know that it would even get that far,” she says.

The case is just one in a long string of legal and legislative actions Republicans are taking at the state and federal level to either undermine or bolster the ACA.

Earlier this year, O’Connor sided with Texas and five other states and threw out an Obama administration tax on states receiving Medicaid funds.

The Republican-controlled Congress has tried more than 50 times to repeal Obamacare, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said this week that Republicans may try again in 2019.

While the signature legislation of the Obama era has been dinged and dented, it’s also proven to be remarkably resilient.

Wilensky says the ACA is resilient because it solves a problem “for a small but non-trivial group of people,” and that Republicans don’t have a credible alternative.

“Once a benefit is in place for any measurable amount of time, certainly two or three years would qualify, there’s no precedent for removing it,” she says.

“And most of the proposals that had come up did not seriously get the job done,” Wilensky says.

“They really weren’t effective as an alternative and you simply aren’t going to take away a benefit, like the extension of insurance to people who are above the poverty line and not offered traditionally employer sponsored insurance without having a credible alternative.”

“It’s just not going to happen because there are too many issues that have already been adjudicated at a more serious level,” Wilensky says. “I don’t know why they did this other than that this is 20 attorneys general and they’re running for something.”