“Twenty-six states on Tuesday asked the Supreme Court to overturn the health care reform law’s mandatory state expansion of the Medicaid program, a sleeper issue in the health care reform lawsuit that could determine how much leverage the federal government has with the states on any issue.
The states, led by Florida, argue that the federal government can’t force them to expand the Medicaid program, which has operated as a partnership between the feds and the states, as part of the 2010 health reform law. They argue that the Medicaid expansion is possibly more coercive than the law’s individual mandate.”
“A broad coalition of patient advocates Wednesday asked the Obama administration to slow down its implementation of a key regulation under the healthcare law. A group of 75 patient organizations asked the Health and Human Services Department to allow more time for public comment on its proposal for defining ‘essential health benefits.’ The healthcare law directs HHS to define a package of essential benefits that all insurance plans will have to cover beginning in 2014.”
“Today, the Department of Health and Human Services announced that, ‘Trustmark Life Insurance Company has proposed unreasonable health insurance premium increases in five states—Alabama, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wyoming. The excessive rate hikes would affect nearly 10,000 residents across these five states.’… This rate increase action by HHS is just political grandstanding as the Obama administration tries to sell a still unpopular law.
But it is dangerous grandstanding.”
“Another ObamaCare provision is falling on its face, but this is one that hardly anyone even knew existed.
Part of the law called for the creation of “Consumer Operated and Oriented Plans” (CO-OPs). The law originally appropriated $6 billion to set up these plans in all 50 states. It created an entirely new section of the Internal Revenue Code (Sect 501-C-29) to allow this new type of member-operated organization to be tax-exempt. They were intended to be sort of like the “public option” the Democrats wanted to compete with private insurance plans.”
“If you’ve never heard of the law’s medical loss ratio (MLR) provision, you’re certainly not alone. This simple calculation has had the effect of radically reducing what health insurance agents earn. That, in turn as greatly restricted their ability to help million of Americans navigate the maze of approvals needed for medical procedures and processing claims. It has also had a devastating effect on these agents’ businesses and is disrupting the insurance market.”
“Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius hopes you will believe her and not your own eyes, as she pens an op-ed in the Washington Post deceptively entitled, ‘The Affordable Care Act, helping Americans curb health-care costs.’
Health costs are rising, as we all can see, and independent analysts confirm they will accelerate under Obamacare.”