“RICHMOND — Republican leaders of Virginia’s House of Delegates, who have staunchly opposed Medicaid expansion all year, plan to put the question to a floor vote as early as Thursday in a special legislative session.
The GOP-dominated chamber is widely expected to shoot down the proposed $2 billion-a-year expansion, although a few conservative legislators have expressed fears that the measure might defy expectations and pass — just as a then-record tax hike did when Democrat Mark R. Warner was governor a decade ago.”
“Enrolling in Missouri’s Medicaid program has not been easy.
Many applicants have experienced a barrage of problems when trying to sign up for the program, including long delays until coverage kicks in, lost paperwork and a lack of one-on-one interaction with caseworkers. State officials have blamed a new computer system used to process Medicaid applications.
But there is another reason why some Missourians struggle to get help.
When Deborah Weaver, 28, had issues enrolling in the state’s Medicaid coverage for pregnant women, a switch from her Medicaid disability coverage, she was directed to use a toll-free number, 1-855-373-4636. When she called, Weaver endured long waits and received no guidance.”
“Very few industries in bed with Obamacare come off smelling like a rose. But if one had to pick a bad actor above all others, it would probably be Big Health Insurance.
America’s largest and most influential health insurance companies actively supported passage of Obamacare in Congress, and continue to do so today. That’s not surprising, since the heart of Obamacare is a mandate on Americans to purchase the product the health insurance companies are selling (the individual mandate). The “essential minimum coverage” on “qualified health insurance plans” as dictated by the Department of Health and Human Services tend to emphasize first dollar insurance coverage whenever possible, which increases insurance company profits. Worst of all, insurance companies are the beneficiaries of a giant taxpayer bailout that makes their Obamacare participation a “heads they win, tails taxpayers lose” kind of scenario.”
“Just days before the security of the Obamacare website is the subject of a new report by an independent government agency, a watchdog group today released documents showing federal health officials knew about security vulnerabilities in the run-up to the site’s shaky launch last fall.
Judicial Watch said it obtained 94 pages of government documents detailing HealthCare.gov’s “massive” security risks.
The documents, the watchdog said, show that officials at the Department of Health and Human Services and a subordinate agency, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, decided to roll out the online insurance exchange despite knowledge of the security flaws.”
“If you are looking for information on how Americans are engaging with the Affordable Care Act, the Census Bureau’s recently released latest annual estimates of health insurance coverage is probably not the place to look—at least for now.
The Census Bureau, which derives its information on healthcare from the Annual Social and Economic Supplement—the same survey where it asks how many toilets, computers, microwaves, etc., people have in their homes—does provide some useful insights.
It catalogues the demographic characteristics of the population based on participation in different types of health insurance coverage—government health care programs, private employer and individual plans, and the uninsured. It tells us young adults make up a disproportionate share of the uninsured and provides useful information on the relative availability of employer-sponsored coverage by industry and firm size.
But its hard numbers on enrollment and enrollment trends are not reliable for drawing “big picture” conclusions, especially regarding the ACA. Indeed, that unreliability is why this year the Census Bureau started using a new set of health coverage questions in the ASEC.”
“Obamacare—or at least the version of it that the president and his advisers currently think they can get away with putting into place—has been upending arrangements and reshuffling the deck in the health system since the beginning of the year. That’s when the new insurance rules, subsidies, and optional state Medicaid expansions went into effect. The law’s defenders say the changes that have been set in motion are irreversible, in large part because several million people are now covered by insurance plans sold through the exchanges, and a few million more are enrolled in Medicaid as a result of Obamacare. President Obama has stated repeatedly that these developments should effectively shut the door on further debate over the matter.
Of course, the president does not get to decide when public debates begin or end, and the public seems to be in no mood to declare the Obamacare case closed. Polling has consistently shown that more Americans oppose the law than support it, and that the opposition is far more intense than the support. The law is built on a foundation of dramatically expanded government power over the nation’s health system, which strikes many voters as a dangerous step toward more bureaucracy, less choice, higher costs, and lower quality care. The beginning of the law’s implementation does not appear to have eased these fears, and in some cases has exacerbated them.”
“The uninsured rate for kids under age 18 hasn’t budged under the health law, according to a new study, even though they’re subject to the law’s requirement to have insurance just as their parents and older siblings are. Many of those children are likely eligible for coverage under Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
The Urban Institute’s health reform monitoring survey analyzed data on approximately 2,500 children, comparing the uninsured rate in June 2014 with the previous year, before the health insurance marketplaces opened and the individual mandate took effect. It found that rates remained statistically unchanged at just over 7 percent for both time periods.”
“Since the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) passage, a number of lawsuits have been filed challenging various provisions of the law. The Supreme Court has decided cases about the constitutionality of the ACA’s individual mandate and Medicaid expansion as well as the applicability of the contraceptive coverage requirement to closely held for-profit corporations with religious objections. In addition, several cases challenging the availability of premium subsidies in the Federally-Facilitated Marketplace (FFM) are currently progressing through the federal courts. All of this litigation has altered, or has the potential to alter, the way in which the ACA is implemented and consequently could affect the achievement of the law’s policy goals. This issue brief examines the federal courts’ role to date in interpreting and affecting implementation of the ACA, with a focus on the provisions that seek to expand access to affordable coverage.
Court decisions about how to interpret the ACA will continue to affect the number of people who ultimately obtain affordable coverage. At present, access to Medicaid up to 138% FPL is dependent upon where people live because the Supreme Court held that implementation of the ACA’s Medicaid expansion is effectively a state option. This has resulted in a coverage gap for just over 4.5 million people with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid but too low to qualify for Marketplace subsidies in the states that have not implemented the ACA’s Medicaid expansion to date.”
“Congress’ investigative arm said Tuesday (Sept. 16) that healthcare.gov continues to face security weaknesses, leaving the site subject to “increased and unnecessary” risk of unauthorized access, disclosure or modification of the information collected and maintained. CMS pledged to implement some of the fixes proposed by the Government Accountability Office, but GOP lawmakers used the opportunity to again blast the administration’s handling of Obamacare.
GAO recommended six ways CMS could put in place an effective information security program, and another 22 technical recommendations that could improve the effectiveness of information security controls.”
“Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin (D) said Tuesday (Sept. 16) that the state has shut down its exchange website as it scrambles to finish operational and other improvements by Nov. 15, but the state expects the site to be “restored to full, improved operation before the start of open enrollment.”
The state made the decision to shut down the site after consulting with CMS, Shumlin said in a statement. The state also announced a number of management changes that will remove oversight of the exchange from the Department of Vermont Health Access and install Lawrence Miller, a senior advisor to the governor, as the person responsible for operational leadership of Vermont Health Connect. The Department of Vermont Health Access oversees the state’s Medicaid program.
“As all Vermonters know, we’ve had disappointment after disappointment with the Vermont Health Connect website,” Shumlin said. “I have been very frustrated that the website remains incomplete. Bringing down the site now to make improvements with our new partner Optum is the best choice to deliver a well-functioning, secure website for customers by the open enrollment period that begins Nov. 15.””