Last year I estimated that the combined effect of various Republican efforts to sabotage the ACA caused average unsubsidized monthly premiums to increase by an additional $80/month on average nationally, or around $960 more for the full year per enrollee than they otherwise would have had to pay this year. The exact amount varied widely by state, region, metal level and actual policy, of course.
The 2017 sabotage efforts mainly included the cut-off of Cost Sharing Reduction (CSR) reimbursement payments, but also included a mish-mash of other efforts such as the Open Enrollment Period being cut in half, HealthCare.Gov's marketing budget being cut by 90%, HC.gov's outreach/navigator budget being cut 40%, confusion about whether or not the Individual Mandate would be enforced and, of course, the general confusion about whether or not the ACA itself would be repealed given the half-dozen efforts by Congressional Republicans to do so throughout the year.
Insurance Commissioner Highlights Minimal Rate Increases, More Consumer Choice in 2019 Health Insurance Rate Filings
Harrisburg, PA - Insurance Commissioner Jessica Altman today publicly released the 2019 requested rate filings for individual and small group health insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act, highlighting minimal rate increases and increased choices for many Pennsylvania consumers, including a new insurer in the individual market.
“Pennsylvanians want and deserve access to the comprehensive health coverage that the ACA provides. Enrollment over the past few years has remained steady, and this fall enrollees will have more choices, despite the Trump Administration’s relentless efforts to dismantle the ACA,” Gov. Tom Wolf said. “My administration is committed to ensuring that Pennsylvanians remain informed about their growing options and have access to quality, affordable health insurance.”
I noted a few weeks ago that the Oregon Division of Financial Regulation had issued their preliminary rulings on 2019 individual and small group market rate filings. At the time, they had whittled down the average requested indy market rate changes from 10.5% down to 7.8%, while leaving the requested small group rate changes the same (around 5-6% on average).
However, they also made sure to note that there was still one more round of reviews to go through before final, approved 2019 rate changes were locked in. Yesterday the OR DFR came out with those, making only slight further changes on the individual market (they bumped Kaiser up by 0.2 points while lowering Providence by 1.1 points). Providence has twice as many enrollees as Kaiser, so this resulted in an overall, weighted statewide average rate increase of 7.3%.
The final small group market rates were changed a bit more--Providence's increase was cut in half, while UnitedHealthcare's hike was cut by a couple of points.
The Connecticut Insurance Department is reviewing 14 health insurance rate filings for the 2019 individual and small group markets. The filings were made by 10 health insurers for plans that currently cover about 293,000 people.
Two carriers – Anthem and ConnectiCare Benefits Inc. (CBI) – have filed rates for both individual and small group plans that will be marketed through Access Health CT, the state-sponsored health insurance exchange.
The 2019 proposed rate increases for both the individual and small group market are, on average lower, than last year:
...back in February...the executive board of the DC ACA exchange unanimously voted to reinstate the mandate. It didn't mean all that much at the time, however, because the authority to reinstate it actually belongs to the DC Council.
Well, thanks to Mr. Levitis for the heads up. If you scroll down to Page 138, you can see that the DC Council has indeed done just that:
TITLE V. HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
SUBTITLE A. INDIVIDUAL HEALTH INSURANCE REQUIREMENT
Sec. 5001. Short title.
This subtitle may be cited as the “Health Insurance Requirement Amendment Act of 2018”.
Sec. 5002. Title 47 of the District of Columbia Official Code is amended as follows:
(a) The table of contents is amended by adding a new chapter designation to read as follows:
“51. Individual Taxpayer Health Insurance Responsibility Requirement”.
(b) A new Chapter 51 is added to read as follows: “CHAPTER 51. INDIVIDUAL TAXPAYER HEALTH INSURANCE RESPONSIBILITY REQUIREMENT.
Note: Most of this isn't limited to Michigan...nearly all of the items listed here could/should be applied in other states as well.
Dear Democratic nominees for Michigan State House and State Senate:
Hi there, and congratulations on your primary victory!
If you're familiar with me and this site, you probably know three things about me:
1. I strongly support achieving Universal Healthcare coverage, and I'd ideally prefer to utilize some sort of Single Payer system as the payment mechanism to do so.
2. However, even with the recent strengthening in support, I remain skeptical that a SP/Medicare-for-All type of law is feasible yet, for a number of reasons I've talked about before but won't go into right now.
3. Having said that, during the interim between today and whatever the Next Big Thing is in healthcare (whether it's Medicare for All, Medicare X, Medicare Extra (my personal favorite), Medicaid Buy-In, Medicare Part E, CHIPA, USEAHIA, Healthy America or some other federal program), I strongly believe that it is vitally important to protect, repair and strengthen the Affordable Care Act even if it ends up being replaced by something else in the near future.
Update: The court has instead opted to dismiss the case; but states can bring action again if circumstances change i.e. Admin blocks silver-loading in 2020 and beyond. IHP story TK @nicholas_bagley@charles_gaba taking comments ! https://t.co/cPHJlmehsH
MNsure again giving Minnesotans more time to shop for health coverage for 2019
Minnesotans will have an extra month to shop for coverage again this year
ST. PAUL, MN--Today MNsure announced the dates during which Minnesotans will have time to shop for 2019 health coverage. Open enrollment will begin on Nov. 1, 2018, and run through Jan. 13, 2019. This is nearly a month longer than the federal open enrollment period that runs from Nov. 1 to Dec. 15. As a state-based marketplace, MNsure has authority to supplement the upcoming federal open enrollment period with a special enrollment period to give Minnesotans more time to shop.
"Shopping for health coverage is a complex process, and Minnesotans rely on the free in-person assistance offered by MNsure’s assister network," said acting CEO Nate Clark. "This year our assisters face additional challenges given the amount of change coming to Minnesota’s Medicare plans. The extra time to shop will ensure that all MNsure consumers who need it will get that vital assistance."
“Our rate reduction would have been larger, but we had to account for added uncertainty in our rates due to indefinite suspension (the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) placed on risk adjustment transfers between insurers,” said , said Mary Danielson, a BCBST spokeswoman. “Again, we were planning a larger reduction – around 18 percent – but needed to factor in the prospect of greater costs for 2019.”
Hmmm...the wording here is interesting: “Improved and expanded” Medicare for All. If it’s “for all” isn’t “expanded” redundant? Or is this a nod towards “for all who want it”? Cc @colinb1123
We‘re fighting for Improved & Expanded Medicare for All.
We‘re fighting for college + trade school without crushing debt.
We‘re fighting for dignified retirement for our elders, and a Green New Deal for our children.
The cost of plans through Nevada’s health insurance exchange are anticipated to only increase by an average of 1.9 percent next year in what the state’s insurance commissioner said is the lowest proposed rate increase from insurance companies since the Affordable Care Act went into effect in 2014.
The announcement, made by the Division of Insurance late Tuesday morning, comes amid ongoing uncertainty about the impact that Congress’s repeal of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and federal rule changes for two types of non-ACA-compliant health plans will have on the individual market as a whole. Insurance Commissioner Barbara Richardson cautioned that the proposed rates are subject to change based on any action by the federal government and said the division is working “diligently” to review the proposed rates from insurance companies.
That 1.9% figure is slightly misleading, though, because...
This year, thanks to their reinsurance program, ACA individual market premiums dropped by around 23.6% on average, from a whopping $1,040/month to "only" $795/month per enrollee.
No Load: They could gamble that the CSR problem would be resolved and the payments would be made after all (i.e., they would price normally).
Broad Load: They could spread the CSR cost out evenly across all of their 2018 ACA policies, on exchange & off.
Silver Load: They could load the CSR costs onto all Silver plans only (both on & off exchange).
Silver Switcharoo: They could load CSR costs onto all on-exchange Silver plans only, while also creating "mirror" Silver plans off-exchange without any CSR load.
Mixed Load: Each insurance carrier could choose whichever of the other 4 strategies they wanted to and let the chips fall where they may. Not sure if this really counts as a "strategy", since it's more or less "all of the above".
DENVER (July 13, 2018) – The Colorado Division of Insurance, part of the Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA), today released preliminary information for proposed health plans and premiums for 2019 for individuals and small groups. Colorado consumers can file formal comments on these plans through August 3.
2018 Companies Return for 2019 The same seven companies that offered on-exchange, individual plans are returning for 2019 - Anthem (as HMO Colorado), Bright Health, Cigna Health and Life, Denver Health Medical Plans, Friday Health Plans, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Colorado and Rocky Mountain HMO. And like in past years, this means that all counties in Colorado will have at least one on-exchange company selling individual health plans.
