22,000 New England seniors can’t keep the coverage they have. Harvard Pilgrim announced this week that it is getting out of the market for Medicare Advantage in response to the massive cuts coming to this popular program.
“We must repeal the recently enacted government takeover of healthcare that disregarded the will of the people, and then replace it with genuine reforms that give control to patients and doctors, rather than bureaucrats; honor our traditions of freedom of choice and privacy; make medical care, and the practice of medicine, affordable; promote a system in which good and timely care is available to all our citizens; and encourage continued innovation and investment in the development of new medical treatments.”
Created by The Independent Women’s Voice and American Majority Action
Almost no-one is signing up for this program. Could it be that they don’t want to pay for it? Could it be that people know that they can get it at any time…..so why sign up for it until they have a serious problem? Is this even insurance anymore?
Just over 6 months from implementation, and logical adverse consequences of this 2,700 page monstrosity are now ocuring:
1) McDonalds internal memo shows that they are seriously considering dropping their limited medical plan for their 30,000 employees because of the regulations.
2) The Principal insurance company sends out a memo to brokers saying they are OUT of the health insurance markets.
3) Many national carriers discontinue Child Only policies due to mandatory guaranteed issue status.
4) Secretary of HHS Sebelius puts a gag order on insurance companies saying she will have “zero tolerance” on insurance companies who blame Obamacare for… Read the rest
I received an announcement that The Principal is getting out of the health insurance business.
That means 850,000 subscribers will NOT BE ABLE TO KEEP THEIR PLANS (yes, even if they like them).
They believe that they can no longer be profitable under the Obamacare mandates, regulations, and penalties.
Insurance Executives and shareholders around the country are asking the same question. How long can we maintain profitability under the new draconian laws? Should we stay in business? Should we focus on something else?
Principal determined that they are better off getting out.
So Obamacare becomes law, and within 6 Months, insurance companies no longer offer some plans! Several large insurance companies are no longer going to offer child-only policies to children under 19. This is a direct result of the Obamacare mandate that prohibits any insurance companies from excluding pre-existing conditions for those under 19.
Given that some or many would be able to game the system by not enrolling until a child became seriously ill or injured, insurance companies have elected to discontinue all new policies to children only.
So insurance companies will face the wrath of Secretary Sebelius if they dare to be critical of Obamacare, and even worse if they link premium increases to the new law. The Secretary went so far as to say that she will have “zero tolerance” and that companies who do so could be banned from the future process.
What really makes this ironic is the contrast between this limitation on free speech, and the way President Obama used speech during his campaign to pass Obamacare.
Back then he and his supporters spoke in glowing terms about all… Read the rest
Last week at the White House, President Obama gave his first press conference since May. He was asked by ABC News’ Jake Tapper for a response to the latest Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services actuarial report. “On health care reform, this is six months since health care passed. You pledged that you would bend the cost curve,” Tapper said. “And CMS reported yesterday that the cost curve is actually bending up: from 6.1 percent to 6.3 percent post-health care legislation.”
The president responded by emphasizing that bending the cost curve would take time,… Read the rest
“So it’s a pretty safe bet that the state-based exchanges envisaged in the Affordable Care Act will be so complicated and bewildering that the services of brokers will still be needed..”
“There will be zero tolerance for this type of misinformation and unjustified rate increases,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a letter to the insurance lobby.
“Simply stated, we will not stand idly by as insurers blame their premium hikes and increased profits on the requirement that they provide consumers with basic protections,” Sebelius said. She warned that bad actors may be excluded from new health insurance markets that will open in 2014 under the law. They’d lose out on a big pool of customers, as many as 30 million people nationwide.
READ AP ARTICLE HERE
Aetna, one of the nation’s largest health insurers, said the extra benefits forced it to seek rate increases for new individual plans of 5.4% to 7.4% in California and 5.5% to 6.8% in Nevada after Sept. 23. Similar steps are planned across the country, according to Aetna.
Regence BlueCross BlueShield of Oregon said the cost of providing additional benefits under the health law will account on average for 3.4 percentage points of a 17.1% premium rise for a small-employer health plan. It asked regulators last month to approve the increase.
In Wisconsin and North Carolina, Celtic… Read the rest
According to the AP, more than 3 million retirees who subscribe to Medicare prescription drug coverage will find that their plans have been canceled. This is part of Obamacare’s “simplification” strategy. The article states that “instead of 40 or more plans in each state, beneficiaries would be able to pick from 30 or so”
So……”if you like your plan”…..and you are one of the 3 million, YOU WILL NOT BE ALLOWED TO KEEP YOUR PLAN.
Mercer’s National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans projected that the health reform law will add 2 to 3% for 2011 plans, on top of medical inflation of 9 to 10 percent….and there’s more to come in future years….
PPACA requires small group insurers pay out 80% of all premiums in Medical Losses, and 85% of large group claims in the same (MLR).
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners has taken steps to define what may be included in the MLR.
Still undetermined: How Federal Taxes will be treated in the calculations. Since they are mandatory, many believe that taxes should be excluded from the equation.
Via CCH Update:
90% of companies anticipate losing grandfathered status under health reform
While many U.S. companies initially hoped they could preserve much of their existing group health plans under the new grandfathered provision, a new survey by Hewitt Associates shows that almost all now believe they will not. Ninety percent of companies surveyed said they anticipate losing grandfathered status by 2014, with the majority expecting to lose this status in the next two years.
