In early January, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case, Becerra v. Braidwood Management, Inc. that could substantially weaken the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) guarantee of no-cost preventive services in private insurance. Specifically, the federal government, under the Biden administration, challenged the Fifth Circuit’s ruling that the recommendations of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) are unenforceable because the manner in which the USPSTF members are selected violates the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution. With the change in administration, there are concerns that the federal government may no longer defend the law or, through administrative actions, may stop enforcement of the ACA’s preventive services coverage provision, or otherwise weaken the preventive services requirements. 

Free access to life-saving care has been a core protection of the ACA and remains one of the most popular provisions of the law. In a recent article for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s State Health & Value Strategies program, Sabrina Corlette of Georgetown’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms and Tara Straw from Manatt Health discuss the actions states can take to preserve no-cost preventive services coverage in their regulated markets through legislative or administrative means. 

Read the full article here.