The Republican congressional leadership has made a new timetable for gutting the Affordable Care Act, aiming to get legislation done by March or possibly April.
But that doesn’t give insurers much time to meet their first deadline for submitting plans for 2018 on the individual market, which includes the law’s exchanges.
A rule published four days before President Trump took office set the deadlines for insurers to sell health plans on the individual market, which is for people who don’t get insurance through their jobs. Democrats have charged that Republicans will throw the market into chaos by repealing the law without an alternative, with Republicans responding that the markets are already in turmoil.
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It’s an exciting time for our country. With a unified Republican government in place, the coming months are shaping up to be a busy time working to put real solutions in place to help the American people.
At the forefront of the agenda is repealing Obamacare and rebuilding our health care system in order to provide quality health care, at an affordable price, to the citizens of our country. It’s no small task, but one we are committed to doing — and doing right.
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Republicans have been rolling out their suggestions for replacing Obamacare, providing lots of ideas for leadership to draw from but also highlighting intra-party divisions over how it should be done.
Some lawmakers want to provide people with tax credits to buy coverage, while others want deductions. Some House conservatives are suspicious of phasing out Obamacare gradually. And a growing group of senators are stressing that replace must happen at the same time as repeal.
The party is united around the idea that there must be some sort of healthcare reform, but it’s divided over how quickly to repeal the law, how long it should take to phase out and whether a replacement needs to be passed at the same time.
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Tom Price, President Trump’s choice for secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), has the distinction of being a better fit for the department he’s been picked to lead than any other Trump cabinet nominee. But this hasn’t helped Price gain Senate confirmation.
Price, 62, is an orthopedic surgeon. He ran an orthopedic clinic for 20 years in Atlanta before returning to Emory University, where he had finished his residency, as an assistant professor of orthopedic surgery. He also ran a clinic at Grady Memorial, Atlanta’s largest public hospital.
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