Tag Archives: Preexisting Conditions

Judge rules Trump AHP expansion unlawful ‘end-run’ around ACA

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https://www.healthcaredive.com/news/judge-rules-trump-ahp-expansion-unlawful-end-run-around-aca/551601/

Image result for association health plans

Dive Brief:

  • A federal judge on Thursday struck down a Trump administration expansion of association health plans, which aren’t bound by the requirements of the Affordable Care Act. U.S. District Judge John Bates said the June rule from the Department of Labor that loosened restrictions on what groups could band together to offer AHPs “is clearly an end-run around the ACA.”
  • The ruling stems from a lawsuit 11 states and the District of Columbia filed to challenge the DOL rule. It comes the same week the Trump administration stepped up its attacks against the ACA, arguing in a court filing Monday the law should be eliminated in its entirety following a Texas judge’s decision the act is unconstitutional without the individual mandate penalty.
  • The judge had strong language condemning the administration’s attempt to allow for easier creation and use of AHPs, calling the regulatory change a “magic trick” that allowed for “absurd results” undermining the intent of Congress.

Dive Insight:

The ruling is a blow to the Trump administration’s efforts to circumvent the ACA, which ramped up significantly with the administration’s filing this week seeking complete repeal of the law. Another hit to those efforts came down Wednesday when a different federal judge struck down Medicaid work requirements in Arkansas and Kentucky.

The renewed fight comes as Democrats lining up for a 2020 presidential run are pushing for more progressive policies than have previously gained public traction. Some Democratic contenders are making Medicare for all and other single-payer models a central part of their platforms as healthcare shapes up to be a major issue for the next presidential election.

Experts have argued extended use of AHPs could siphon away young and healthy people looking for minimum coverage at a lower cost. If they choose AHPs they upset the balance on risk pools for more comprehensive coverage. Also, many consumers don’t understand the tradeoff and could be surprised by what isn’t covered when they are in need.

But even though the plans aren’t required to meet ACA standards, some that have formed have been adamant they provide adequate coverage, including the 10 essential ACA benefits. The plans are less obstructive to the regulatory environment than short-term health plans, which have also been granted more leeway under the Trump administration.

Land O’Lakes, for example, which said it was the first to offer an AHP under the more relaxed rules, said its plan covered essential benefits and pre-existing conditions, as well as “broad network coverage.”

The Society of Actuaries has said as many as 10% of people in ACA plans could leave for AHPs, which would also drive up premiums for plans in the individual market. Avalere predicted about 3.2 million people would shift and premiums would rise by 3.5%.

Supporters of AHPs decried the judge’s decision Thursday. Kev Coleman, founder of AssocationHealthPlans.com, said in a statement the ruling will hurt small businesses throughout the country.

“Thousands of employees and family members within the small business community have already enrolled in association health plans — which help lower health care costs — since they first became available last fall,” he said. “They have provided a means by which broad benefits may be accessed at more economical prices. While I do not believe today’s ruling will survive appeal, I believe Judge Bates’ decision is an unnecessary detour on small businesses’ path toward more affordable health coverage.”

 

 

Trump’s all-or-nothing gamble

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https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-vitals-2bc1069a-f66e-4a33-8406-763284c3a0e1.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosvitals&stream=top

The Trump administration’s new legal argument against the Affordable Care Act is a political risk. It may also be a liability in court.

How it works: The legal issue here is “severability” — if the ACA’s individual mandate is unconstitutional, can it be struck down in isolation? Or is it too intertwined with other parts of the law?

Flashback: We’ve seen this movie before — in 2012, at the Supreme Court.

  • According to behind-the-scenes reporting from the 2012 ACA case, four conservative justices wanted to strike down the entire law. Chief Justice John Roberts reportedly wanted to strike down the mandate and protections for pre-existing conditions while leaving the rest intact.
  • But the other conservatives wouldn’t budge, and faced with a choice between upholding or striking down the whole thing, Roberts chose the former.

The Justice Department has now forced that same all-or-nothing decision into the case now pending before the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.

“There’s no way they were getting Roberts’ vote anyway … but this won’t help,” said Jonathan Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University who helped spearhead a different challenge to the ACA.

  • “It’s contrary to everything he’s ever said and done on severability,” Adler argues.

It may not get that far. “I think the states ultimately lose,” Adler said. “I think the most likely outcome is they lose in the 5th Circuit. If they don’t lose at the 5th Circuit, they will lose at the Supreme Court.”

If that’s what happens, adopting this riskier legal strategy may ultimately be the only thing that saves Republicans from the political nightmare of wiping out 20 million people’s health care coverage with no strategy on how to replace it.

  • I’ll spare you a long list of quotes from President Trump’s trip to Capitol Hill yesterday. Suffice it to say that no, Republicans still do not have a plan for what happens next if they finally succeed in killing the ACA. Some things never change.

 

 

 

Justice Dept. now wants the entire ACA struck down

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https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-vitals-badd31d3-c5eb-4423-9cfa-b5d6ea8e7daa.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosvitals&stream=top

The Justice Department now wants the courts to strike down the entire Affordable Care Act — not just its protections for people with pre-existing conditions.

This is a stunning escalation, raising both the real-world and political stakes in a lawsuit where both the real-world and political stakes were already very high.

Where it stands: Judge Reed O’Connor ruled in December that the ACA’s individual mandate has become unconstitutional, and that the whole law must fall along with it.

  • At the time, the Trump administration argued that the courts should only throw out the mandate and protections for pre-existing conditions — not the whole law.
  • But in a one-page filing last night, DOJ said the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals should affirm O’Connor’s entire ruling.

Why it matters: If DOJ ultimately gets its way here, the ripple effects would be cataclysmic. The ACA’s insurance exchanges would go away. So would its Medicaid expansion. Millions would lose their coverage.

  • The FDA would lose have the authority to approve an entire class of drugs.
  • The federal government would lose a lot of its power to test new payment models — in fact, the administration is relying on some of those ACA powers as it explores conservative changes to Medicaid.

Politically, this makes no sense. Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi must be dancing in the streets.

  • Health care — specifically pre-existing conditions — was overwhelmingly a winning issue for Democrats in 2018.
  • This lawsuit already had Republicans in an unpleasant bind.
  • Now the administration is doubling down, putting even more people’s coverage on the chopping block.

What they’re saying:

  • “The bad faith on display here is jaw-dropping,” pro-ACA legal expert Nick Bagley writes.
  • “I was among those who cheered the selection of William Barr as Attorney General and hoped his confirmation would herald the elevation of law over politics within the Justice Department. I am still hopeful, but this latest filing is not a good sign,” said Jonathan Adler, a conservative law professor who helped spearhead the last big ACA lawsuit.

 

 

 

The Trump Administration Now Thinks the Entire ACA Should Fall

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The Trump Administration Now Thinks the Entire ACA Should Fall

Image result for aca court ruling

In a stunning, two-sentence letter submitted to the Fifth Circuit today, the Justice Department announced that it now thinks the entire Affordable Care Act should be enjoined. That’s an even more extreme position than the one it advanced at the district court in Texas v. Azar, when it argued that the court should “only” zero out the protections for people with preexisting conditions.

The bad faith on display here is jaw-dropping. Does the administration really think that the very position it advanced just month ago is so untenable that it must now adopt an even crazier view?

Much as it may dislike the fact, the Trump administration has an obligation to defend acts of Congress. Absent that obligation, the sitting administration could pick and choose which laws it wants to defend, and which it wants to throw under the bus. Indeed, the decision not to defend is close cousin to a decision not to enforce the law. If the ACA really is unconstitutional, wouldn’t continuing to apply the law would violate the very Constitution that empowers the President to act?

Even apart from that, the sheer reckless irresponsibility is hard to overstate. The notion that you could gut the entire ACA and not wreak havoc on the lives of millions of people is insane. The Act  is now part of the plumbing of the health-care system. Which means the Trump administration has now committed itself to a legal position that would inflict untold damage on the American public.

And for what? Every reputable commentator — on both the left and the right — thinks that Judge O’Connor’s decision invalidating the entire ACA is a joke. To my knowledge, not one has defended it. This is not a “reasonable minds can differ” sort of case. It is insanity in print.

Yet here we are. An administration that claims to support protections for people with preexisting conditions has now called for undoing not only the parts of the ACA that protect such conditions, but also the entire Medicaid expansion and parts of the law that shield those with employer-sponsored insurance from punitive annual or lifetime caps. Not to mention hundreds of rules having nothing to do with health insurance, including a raft of new taxes, mandatory labeling of calorie counts at chain restaurants, and rules governing biosimilars.

Maybe you think this level of disdain for an Act of Congress is to be expected from the Trump administration. Maybe it’s too much to process because of Russia and immigration and North Korea. But this is not business as usual. This is far beyond the pale. And it is a serious threat to the rule of law.

 

 

The “Medicare for All” Continuum: A New Comparison Tool for Congressional Health Bills Illustrates the Range of Reform Ideas

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https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2019/medicare-all-continuum

Medicare for all paperwork

Several 2020 Democratic presidential candidates have called for “Medicare for All” as a way to expand health coverage and lower U.S. health care costs. Replacing most private insurance with a Medicare-like system for everyone has instilled both hope and fear across the country depending on people’s perspective or financial stake in the current health care system. But a closer look at recent congressional bills introduced by Democrats reveals a set of far more nuanced approaches to improving the nation’s health care system than the term Medicare for All suggests. To highlight these nuances, a new Commonwealth Fund interactive tool launched today illustrates the extent to which each of these reform bills would expand the public dimensions of our health insurance system, or those aspects regulated or run by state and federal government.1

The U.S Health Insurance System Is Both Public and Private

The U.S. health insurance system comprises both private (employer and individual market and marketplace plans) and public (Medicare and Medicaid) coverage sources, as the table below shows. In addition, both coverage sources are paid for by a mix of private and taxpayer-financed public dollars.

Most Americans get their insurance through employers, who either provide coverage through private insurers or self-insure. Employers and employees share the cost through premiums and cost-sharing such as deductibles, copayments, and coinsurance. But the federal government significantly subsidizes employer coverage by excluding employer premium contributions from employees’ taxable income. In 2018 this subsidy amounted to $280 billion, the largest single tax expenditure.

About 27 million people are covered through regulated private plans sold in the individual market, including the Affordable Care Act’s marketplaces. This coverage is financed by premiums and cost-sharing paid by enrollees. The federal government subsidizes these costs for individuals with incomes under $48,560.

For 44 million people, Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program is their primary source of coverage. These public programs are financed by federal and state governments, and small individual premium payments and cost-sharing in some states. In most states, these benefits are provided through private insurers.

Medicare covers 54 million people over age 65 and people with disabilities. The coverage is financed by the federal government along with individual premiums and significant cost-sharing. About 20 million people get their Medicare benefits through private Medicare Advantage plans and most beneficiaries either buy supplemental private insurance or qualify for additional coverage through Medicaid to help lower out-of-pocket costs and add long-term-care benefits.

Millions Still Uninsured or Underinsured, Health Care Costs High

The coverage expansions of the ACA — new regulation of private insurance such as requirements to cover preexisting conditions, subsidies for private coverage on the individual market, and expanded eligibility for Medicaid — lowered the number of uninsured people and made health coverage more affordable for many. But 28 million people remain uninsured and at least 44 million are underinsured. In addition, overall health care and prescription drug costs are much higher in the United States than in other wealthy countries. U.S. health care expenditures are projected to climb to nearly $6 trillion by 2027.

The Medicare for All Continuum

To address these problems, some Democrats running for president in 2020 are supporting Medicare for All. Meanwhile, in Congress, Democrats have introduced a handful of bills that might be characterized as falling along a continuum, with Medicare for All at one end.

As our new Commonwealth Fund interactive tool illustrates, the bills range from adding somewhat more public sector involvement into the system, to adding substantially more public sector involvement. The bills may be broadly grouped into three categories:

  • Adding public plan features to private insurance. These include increasing regulation of private plans such as requiring private insurers who participate in Medicare and Medicaid to offer health plans in the ACA marketplaces, and enhancing federal subsidies for marketplace coverage.
  • Giving people a choice of public plans alongside private plans. These bills include offering a Medicare-like public plan option through the marketplaces, extending that option to employers to offer to their employees, giving people ages 50 to 64 the option to buy in to Medicare, and giving states the option to allow people to buy in to Medicaid. These bills also bring the federal government’s leverage into provider rate-setting and prescription drug price negotiation.
  • Making public plans the primary source of coverage in the U.S. These are Medicare-for-All bills in which all residents are eligible for a public plan that resembles the current Medicare program, but isn’t necessarily the same Medicare program we have today. The bills vary by whether people would pay premiums and face cost-sharing, the degree to which they end current insurance programs and limit private insurance, how provider rates are set, whether global budgets are used for hospitals and nursing homes, and how long-term care is financed. All of the bills in this category allow people to purchase supplemental coverage for benefits not covered by the plan.

Looking Forward

Many Democratic candidates who have called for Medicare for All are cosponsors of more than one of these bills. The continuum of approaches suggests both the possibility of building toward a Medicare for All system over time, or adopting aspects of Medicare for All without the disruption that a major shift in coverage source might create for Americans. We will continue to update the tool as new bills are introduced or refined. Users also can view a comparison tool of other wealthy countries’ health systems, which shows where select countries fall on a continuum ranging from regulated systems of public and private coverage to national insurance programs.

 

 

The Public On Next Steps For The ACA And Proposals To Expand Coverage

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https://www.kff.org/health-reform/poll-finding/kff-health-tracking-poll-january-2019/

Key Findings:

  • Half of the public disapproves of the recent decision in Texas v. United States, in which a federal judge ruled that the 2010 Affordable Care Act (ACA) is unconstitutional and should not be in effect. While the judge’s ruling is broader than eliminating the ACA’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions, this particular issue continues to resonate with the public. Continuing the ACA’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions ranks among the public’s top health care priorities for the new Congress, along with lowering prescription drug costs.
  • This month’s KFF Health Tracking Poll continues to find majority support (driven by Democrats and independents) for the federal government doing more to help provide health insurance for more Americans. One way for lawmakers to expand coverage is by broadening the role of public programs. Nearly six in ten (56 percent) favor a national Medicare-for-all plan, but overall net favorability towards such a plan ranges as high as +45 and as low as -44 after people hear common arguments about this proposal.
  • Larger majorities of the public favor more incremental changes to the health care system such as a Medicare buy-in plan for adults between the ages of 50 and 64 (77 percent), a Medicaid buy-in plan for individuals who don’t receive health coverage through their employer (75 percent), and an optional program similar to Medicare for those who want it (74 percent). Both the Medicare buy-in plan and Medicaid buy-in plan also garner majority support from Republicans (69 percent and 64 percent­).
  • Moving forward, half of Democrats would rather see the new Democratic majority in the U.S. House of Representatives focus their efforts on improving and protecting the ACA (51 percent), while about four in ten want them to focus on passing a national Medicare-for-all plan (38 percent).

 

Health Insurance Coverage Eight Years After the ACA

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https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2019/feb/health-insurance-coverage-eight-years-after-aca

Fewer Uninsured Americans and Shorter Coverage Gaps, But More Underinsured

What does health insurance coverage look like for Americans today, more than eight years after the Affordable Care Act’s passage? In this brief, we present findings from the Commonwealth Fund’s latest Biennial Health Insurance Survey to assess the extent and quality of coverage for U.S. working-age adults. Conducted since 2001, the survey uses three measures to gauge the adequacy of people’s coverage:

  • whether or not they have insurance
  • if they have insurance, whether they have experienced a gap in their coverage in the prior year
  • whether high out-of-pocket health care costs and deductibles are causing them to be underinsured, despite having continuous coverage throughout the year.

As the findings highlighted below show, the greatest deterioration in the quality and comprehensiveness of coverage has occurred among people in employer plans. More than half of Americans under age 65 — about 158 million people — get their health insurance through an employer, while about one-quarter either have a plan purchased through the individual insurance market or are enrolled in Medicaid.1Although the ACA has expanded and improved coverage options for people without access to a job-based health plan, the law largely left the employer market alone.2

Survey Highlights

  • Today, 45 percent of U.S. adults ages 19 to 64 are inadequately insured — nearly the same as in 2010 — though important shifts have taken place.
  • Compared to 2010, many fewer adults are uninsured today, and the duration of coverage gaps people experience has shortened significantly.
  • Despite actions by the Trump administration and Congress to weaken the ACA, the adult uninsured rate was 12.4 percent in 2018 in this survey, statistically unchanged from the last time we fielded the survey in 2016.
  • More people who have coverage are underinsured now than in 2010, with the greatest increase occurring among those in employer plans.
  • People who are underinsured or spend any time uninsured report cost-related problems getting care and difficulty paying medical bills at at higher rates than those with continuous, adequate coverage.
  • Federal and state governments could enact policies to extend the ACA’s health coverage gains and improve the cost protection provided by individual-market and employer plans.

The 2018 Commonwealth Fund Biennial Heath Insurance Survey included a nationally representative sample of 4,225 adults ages 19 to 64. SSRS conducted the telephone survey between June 27 and November 11, 2018.3 (See “How We Conducted This Study” for more detail.)

WHO IS UNDERINSURED?

In this analysis, we use a measure of underinsurance that accounts for an insured adult’s reported out-of-pocket costs over the course of a year, not including insurance premiums, as well as his or her plan deductible. (The measure was first used in the Commonwealth Fund’s 2003 Biennial Health Insurance Survey.*) These actual expenditures and the potential risk of expenditures, as represented by the deductible, are then compared with household income. Specifically, we consider people who are insured all year to be underinsured if:

  • their out-of-pocket costs, excluding premiums, over the prior 12 months are equal to 10 percent or more of household income; or
  • their out-of-pocket costs, excluding premiums, over the prior 12 months are equal to 5 percent or more of household income for individuals living under 200 percent of the federal poverty level ($24,120 for an individual or $49,200 for a family of four); or
  • their deductible constitutes 5 percent or more of household income.

The out-of-pocket cost component of the measure is only triggered if a person uses his or her plan to obtain health care. The deductible component provides an indicator of the financial protection the plan offers and the risk of incurring costs before someone gets health care. The definition does not include other dimensions of someone’s health plan that might leave them potentially exposed to costs, such as copayments or uncovered services. It therefore provides a conservative measure of underinsurance in the United States.

Compared to 2010, when the ACA became law, fewer people today are uninsured, but more people are underinsured. Of the 194 million U.S. adults ages 19 to 64 in 2018, an estimated 87 million, or 45 percent, were inadequately insured (see Tables 1 and 2).

Despite actions by the Trump administration and Congress to weaken the ACA, our survey found no statistically significant change in the adult uninsured rate by late 2018 compared to 2016 (Table 3). This finding is consistent with recent federal surveys, but other private surveys (including other Commonwealth Fund surveys) have found small increases in uninsured rates since 2016 (see “Changes in U.S. Uninsured Rates Since 2013”).

While there has been no change since 2010, statistically speaking, in the proportion of people who are insured now but have experienced a recent time without coverage, these reported gaps are of much shorter duration on average than they were before the ACA. In 2018, 61 percent of people who reported a coverage gap said it has lasted for six months or less, compared to 31 percent who said they had been uninsured for a year or longer. This is nearly a reverse of what it was like in 2012, two years before the ACA’s major coverage expansions. In that year, 57 percent of adults with a coverage gap reported it was for a year or longer, while one-third said it was a shorter gap.

There also has been some improvement in long-term uninsured rates. Among adults who were uninsured at the time of the survey, 54 percent reported they had been without coverage for more than two years, down from 72 percent before the ACA coverage expansions went into effect. The share of those who had been uninsured for six months or less climbed to 20 percent, nearly double the rate prior to the coverage expansions.

Of people who were insured continuously throughout 2018, an estimated 44 million were underinsured because of high out-of-pocket costs and deductibles (Table 1). This is up from an estimated 29 million in 2010 (data not shown). The most likely to be underinsured are people who buy plans on their own through the individual market including the marketplaces. However, the greatest growth in the number of underinsured adults is occurring among those in employer health plans.

WHY ARE INSURED AMERICANS SPENDING SO MUCH OF THEIR INCOME ON HEALTH CARE COSTS?

Several factors may be contributing to high underinsured rates among adults in individual market plans and rising rates in employer plans:

  1. Although the Affordable Care Act’s reforms to the individual market have provided consumers with greater protection against health care costs, many moderate-income Americans have not seen gains. The ACA’s essential health benefits package, cost-sharing reductions for lower- income families, and out-of-pocket cost limits have helped make health care more affordable for millions of Americans. But while the cost-sharing reductions have been particularly important in lowering deductibles and copayments for people with incomes under 250 percent of the poverty level (about $62,000 for a family of four), about half of people who purchase marketplace plans, and all of those buying plans directly from insurance companies, do not have them.4
  2. The bans against insurers excluding people from coverage because of a preexisting condition and rating based on health status have meant that individuals with greater health needs, and thus higher costs, are now able to get health insurance in the individual market. Not surprisingly, the survey data show that people with individual market coverage are somewhat more likely to have health problems than they were in 2010, which means they also have higher costs.
  3. While plans in the employer market historically have provided greater cost protection than plans in the individual market, businesses have tried to hold down premium growth by asking workers to shoulder an increasing share of health costs, particularly in the form of higher deductibles.5 While the ACA’s employer mandate imposed a minimum coverage requirement on large companies, the requirement amounts to just 60 percent of typical person’s overall costs. This leaves the potential for high plan deductibles and copayments.
  4. Growth in Americans’ incomes has not kept pace with growth in health care costs. Even when health costs rise more slowly, they can take an increasingly larger bite out of incomes.

It is well documented that people who gained coverage under the ACA’s expansions have better access to health care as a result.6 This has led to overall improvement in health care access, as indicated by multiple surveys.7 In 2014, the year the ACA’s major coverage expansions went into effect, the share of adults in our survey who said that cost prevented them from getting health care that they needed, such as prescription medication, dropped significantly (Table 4). But there has been no significant improvement since then.

The lack of continued improvement in overall access to care nationally reflects the fact that coverage gains have plateaued, and underinsured rates have climbed. People who experience any time uninsured are more likely than any other group to delay getting care because of cost (Table 5). And among people with coverage all year, those who were underinsured reported cost-related delays in getting care at nearly double the rate of those who were not underinsured.

There was modest but significant improvement following the ACA’s coverage expansions in the proportion of all U.S. adults who reported having difficulty paying their medical bills or said they were paying off medical debt over time (Table 4). Federal surveys have found similar improvements.8 However, those gains have stalled.

Inadequate insurance coverage leaves people exposed to high health care costs, and these expenses can quickly turn into medical debt. More than half of uninsured adults and insured adults who have had a coverage gap reported that they had had problems paying medical bills or were paying off medical debt over time (Table 6). Among people who had continuous insurance coverage, the rate of medical bill and debt problems is nearly twice as high for the underinsured as it is for people who are not underinsured.

Having continuous coverage makes a significant difference in whether people have a regular source of care, get timely preventive care, or receive recommended cancer screenings. Adults with coverage gaps or those who were uninsured when they responded to the survey were the least likely to have gotten preventive care and cancer screenings in the recommended time frame.

Being underinsured, however, does not seem to reduce the likelihood of having a usual source of care or receiving timely preventive care or cancer screens — provided a person has continuous coverage. This is likely because the ACA requires insurers and employers to cover recommended preventive care and cancer screens without cost-sharing. Even prior to the ACA, a majority of employer plans provided predeductible coverage of preventive services.9

Conclusion and Policy Implications

U.S. working-age adults are significantly more likely to have health insurance since the ACA became law in 2010. But the improvement in uninsured rates has stalled. In addition, more people have health plans that fail to adequately protect them from health care costs, with the fastest deterioration in cost protection occurring in the employer market. The ACA made only minor changes to employer plans, and the erosion in cost protection has taken a bite out of the progress made in Americans’ health coverage since the law’s enactment.

Both the federal government and the states, however, have the ability to extend the law’s coverage gains and improve the cost protection of both individual-market and employer plans. Here is a short list of policy options:

  • Expand Medicaid without restrictions. The 2018 midterm elections moved as many as five states closer to joining the 32 states that, along with the District of Columbia, have expanded eligibility for Medicaid under the ACA.10 As many as 300,000 people may ultimately gain coverage as a result.11 But, encouraged by the Trump administration, several states are imposing work requirements on people eligible for Medicaid — a move that could reverse these coverage gains. So far, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has approved similar work-requirement waivers in seven states and is considering applications from at least seven more. Arkansas imposed a work requirement last June, and, to date, more than 18,000 adults have lost their insurance coverage as a result.
  • Ban or place limits on short-term health plans and other insurance that doesn’t comply with the ACA. The Trump administration loosened regulations on short-term plans that don’t comply with the ACA, potentially leaving people who enroll in them exposed to high costs and insurance fraud. These plans also will draw healthier people out of the marketplaces, increasing premiums for those who remain and federal costs of premium subsidies. Twenty-three states have banned or placed limits on short-term insurance policies. Some lawmakers have proposed a federal ban.
  • Reinsurance, either state or federal. The ACA’s reinsurance program was effective in lowering marketplace premiums. After it expired in 2017, several states implemented their own reinsurance programs.12  Alaska’s program reduced premiums by 20 percent in 2018. These lower costs particularly help people whose incomes are too high to qualify for ACA premium tax credits. More states are seeking federal approval to run programs in their states. Several congressional bills have proposed a federal reinsurance program.
  • Reinstate outreach and navigator funding for the 2020 open-enrollment period. The administration has nearly eliminated funding for advertising and assistance to help people enroll in marketplace plans.13 Research has found that both activities are effective in increasing enrollment.14 Some lawmakers have proposed reinstatingthis funding.
  • Lift the 400-percent-of-poverty cap on eligibility for marketplace tax credits. This action would help people with income exceeding $100,000 (for a family of four) better afford marketplace plans. The tax credits work by capping the amount people pay toward their premiums at 9.86 percent. Lifting the cap has a built in phase out: as income rises, fewer people qualify, since premiums consume an increasingly smaller share of incomes. RAND researchers estimate that this policy change would increase enrollment by 2 million and lower marketplace premiums by as much as 4 percent as healthier people enroll. It would cost the federal government an estimated $10 billion annually.15 Legislation has been introduced to lift the cap.
  • Make premium contributions for individual market plans fully tax deductible. People who are self-employed are already allowed to do this.16
  • Fix the so-called family coverage glitch. People with employer premium expenses that exceed 9.86 percent of their income are eligible for marketplace subsidies, which trigger a federal tax penalty for their employers. There’s a catch: this provision applies only to single-person policies, leaving many middle-income families caught in the “family coverage glitch.” Congress could lower many families’ premiums by pegging unaffordable coverage in employer plans to family policies instead of single policies.17

REDUCE COVERAGE GAPS

  • Inform the public about their options. People who lose coverage during the year are eligible for special enrollment periods for ACA marketplace coverage. Those eligible for Medicaid can sign up at any time. But research indicates that many people who lose employer coverage do not use these options.18 The federal government, the states, and employers could increase awareness of insurance options outside the open-enrollment periods through advertising and education.
  • Reduce churn in Medicaid. Research shows that over a two-year period, one-quarter of Medicaid beneficiaries leave the program and become uninsured.19 Many do so because of administrative barriers.20 By imposing work requirements, as some states are doing, this involuntary disenrollment is likely to get worse. To help people stay continuously covered, the federal government and the states could consider simplifying and streamlining the enrollment and reenrollment processes.
  • Extend the marketplace open-enrollment period. The current open-enrollment period lasts just 45 days. Six states that run their own marketplaces have longer periods, some by as much as an additional 45 days. Other states, as well as the federal marketplace, could extend their enrollment periods as well.

IMPROVE INDIVIDUAL-MARKET PLANS’ COST PROTECTIONS

  • Fund and extend the cost-sharing reduction subsidies. The Trump administration eliminated payments to insurers for offering plans with lower deductibles and copayments. Insurers, which by law must still offer reduced-cost plans, are making up the lost revenue by raising premiums. But this fix, while benefiting enrollees who are eligible for premium tax credits, has distorted both insurer pricing and consumer choice.21 In addition, it is unknown whether the administration’s support for the fix will continue in the future, creating uncertainty for insurers.22 Congress could reinstate the payments to insurers and consider making the plans available to people with higher earnings.
  • Increase the number of services excluded from the deductible.Most plans sold in the individual market exclude certain services from the deductible, such as primary care visits and certain prescriptions.23As the survey data suggest, these types of exclusions appear to be important in ensuring access to preventive care among people who have coverage but are underinsured. In 2016, HHS provided a standardized plan option for insurers that excluded eight health services — including mental health and substance-use disorder outpatient visits and most prescription drugs — from the deductible at the silver and gold level.24 The Trump administration eliminated the option in 2018. Congress could make these exceptions mandatory for all plans.

IMPROVE EMPLOYER PLANS’ COST PROTECTIONS

  • Increase the ACA’s minimum level of coverage. Under the ACA, people in employer plans may become eligible for marketplace tax credits if the actuarial value of their plan is less than 60 percent, meaning that under 60 percent of health care costs, on average, are covered. Congress could increase this to the 70 percent standard of silver-level marketplace plans, or even higher.
  • Require deductible exclusions. Congress could require employers to increase the number of services that are covered before someone meets their deductible. Most employer plans exclude at least some services from their deductibles.25 Congress could specify a minimum set of exclusions for employer plans that might resemble the standardized-choice options that once existed for ACA plans.
  • Refundable tax credits for high out-of-pocket costs. Congress could make refundable tax credits available to help insured Americans pay for qualifying out-of-pocket costs that exceed a certain percentage of their income.26
  • Protect consumers from surprise medical bills. Several states have passed laws that protect patients and their families from unexpected medical bills, generally from out-of-network providers.27A bipartisan group of U.S. senators has proposed federal legislation to protect consumers, including people enrolled in employer and individual-market plans.

Health care costs are primarily what’s driving growth in premiums across all health insurance markets. Employers and insurers have kept premiums down by increasing consumers’ deductibles and other cost-sharing, which in turn is making more people underinsured. This means that policy options like the ones we’ve highlighted above will need to be paired with efforts to slow medical spending. These could include changing how health care is organized and providers are paid to achieve greater value for health care dollars and better health outcomes.28 The government also could tackle rising prescription drug costs29 and use antitrust laws to combat the growing concentration of insurer and provider markets.30

 

 

Ads for short-term plans may be confusing

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https://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/issue_briefs/2019/rwjf451339?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosvitals&stream=top

Image result for short term health insurance

People Googling for ACA coverage often found results that were actually trying to sell them skimpier short-term health plans, according to a report from Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Urban Institute.

Why it matters: Consumer confusion is one of the things regulators worried about most when the Trump administration expanded access to “short-term” coverage.

  • For some people, especially those who do only need coverage for a short time, one of these more bare-bones options might be a better choice than the comprehensive policies sold under the ACA.
  • But if you don’t realize you’re signing up for a plan with incredibly limited coverage and the right to drop you once you get sick, you could be in for a catastrophic surprise.
  • That’s why HHS mandated a disclosure statement about the plans’ limited benefits.

Details: Researchers Googled terms including “cheap health insurance” and “Obamacare plans” and looked at the first 4 results — which are usually ads.

  • Sites that included short-term plans “dominated the results,” though some of those sites also sell ACA-compliant plans. Sites varied in how much information they provided about the differences between the two types of plans.

 

Pre-existing conditions at House Ways and Means panel’s first policy hearing

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Dems hit GOP on pre-existing conditions at panel’s first policy hearing

Dems hit GOP on pre-existing conditions at panel's first policy hearing

The powerful House Ways and Means Committee used its first policy hearing of the new Congress to hammer Republicans on pre-existing conditions, an issue that helped propel Democrats into the majority during the 2018 midterm elections.

Democratic panel members highlighted actions by the Trump administration that they argue have hurt people with pre-existing conditions, like the expansion of non-ObamaCare plans that could draw healthy people from the markets, raising premiums for those left behind.

The administration has expanded access to association and short-term health plans, which cost less than ObamaCare plans but cover fewer services. Republicans say they provide an off-ramp for consumers who can’t afford ObamaCare plans.

The witness invited by Republicans, Rob Robertson with the Nebraska Farm Bureau, said its newly developed association health plan “meets the needs of our members,” who can’t afford ObamaCare plans.

“We’re in this for the long term,” he told lawmakers. “We want to reduce costs, and the costs in the individual market are very, very high.”

ObamaCare’s popular consumer protections became the centerpiece of the November midterms after 20 Republican-led states sued to overturn the 2010 health care law, known as the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Democrats tied congressional Republicans to the lawsuit after the Trump administration declined to defend ObamaCare and argued that those protections are unconstitutional.

Republicans say there are different ways to cover people with pre-existing conditions, like high-risk pools, which were banned after ObamaCare was implemented. Some pools had caps on coverage and long-waiting lists.

GOP committee members called Tuesday’s hearing political theatre, arguing they also support pre-existing protections but want to lower ObamaCare’s costs.

“Everyone up here wants protections for people with pre-existing conditions. Always have, always will,” said Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), ranking member of the health subcommittee. “We should be careful that we’re not stoking fear that someone is going to lose their health insurance. We have a responsibility to come up with a better health care system because ObamaCare is not the solution.”

Democrats on Tuesday said the GOP proposals aren’t serious.

Republicans have “political amnesia” and have “forgotten what it was like before the ACA,” said Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), chairman of the health subcommittee. “Those with a diagnosis of a serious disease would also get a diagnosis of financial ruin. There were no protections for them before the ACA.”

Some Democratic panel members appealed to the emotional side of the health care debate, with one lawmaker announcing her cancer diagnosis at the hearing.

“This is a cancer I will live with for the rest of my life, but, because of my high-quality healthcare and insurance coverage, it is not a cancer I will die from,” said Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), 67.

Tensions ran high at times during Tuesday’s hearing, with members re-litigating the 2010 passage of ObamaCare and repeated GOP efforts to repeal it.

“Not one Republican up here supports pre-existing protections for the American people,” said Rep. Brian Higgins (D-N.Y.), who at times pounded his fist on the dais.

That drew a testy response from Rep. Tom Reed (R-Pa.), who said Republicans “heard the voices and the fear” from voters in the 2018 midterms when “this issue became the centerpiece.”

“We listened to this American people, as Republicans,” he said.

 

 

 

ACA lawsuit puts GOP in an awkward position

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https://www.axios.com/affordable-care-act-lawsuit-republicans-2c0aff0e-e870-49af-a15e-554d34d3ad62.html

Image result for aca lawsuit

A lawsuit that threatens to kill the entire Affordable Care Act could be a political disaster for the GOP, but most Republicans aren’t trying to stop it — and some openly want it to succeed.

Between the lines: The GOP just lost the House to Democrats who campaigned heavily on health care, particularly protecting people with pre-existing conditions, but the party’s base still isn’t ready to accept the ACA as the law of the land.

The big picture: A district judge ruled last month that the ACA’s individual mandate is unconstitutional and that the whole law must fall along with it. That decision is being appealed.

  • A victory for the Republican attorneys general who filed the lawsuit — or for the Trump administration’s position — would likely cause millions of people with pre-existing conditions to lose their coverage or see their costs skyrocket.

Some Republicans want the lawsuit to go away.

  • Rep. Greg Walden, ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, supports fully repealing the ACA’s individual mandate, which the 2017 tax law nullified. That’s what sparked this lawsuit, and formal repeal would likely put the legal challenge to rest.
  • Sen. Susan Collins laughed when I asked her whether she hopes the plaintiffs win the case. “No. What a question,” she said.

But other Republicans say they see an opportunity.

  • If the lawsuit prevails, “it means that we could rebuild and make sure that we have a health care system that is going to ensure that individuals are in charge of their health care,” Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers said.
  • Sen. David Perdue said that “of course” he wants the challengers to win, which would “give us an opportunity to get at the real problem, and that is the cost side of health care.”
  • Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said she views the lawsuit “as an opportunity for us to assure pre-existing conditions and make sure that we fix some of the broken problems,” but that she doesn’t know if it’d be good if the plaintiffs win.

The bottom line: “The longer we’re talking about preexisting conditions, the longer we’re losing. We need to focus on a message that can win us voters in 2020. The debate of preexisting conditions was a stone-cold loser for us in 2018,” said Matt Gorman, the communications director for House Republicans’ campaign arm during the 2018 cycle.