JoAnn Volk, Emily Curran and Justin Giovannelli Health Care Sharing Ministries (HCSMs) are a form of health coverage in which members – who typically share a religious belief – make monthly payments to cover expenses of other members. HCSMs do not have to comply with the consumer protections of the Affordable Care Act and may provide value for some individuals,…
…have access to comprehensive, affordable health insurance. The group of experts* designed a District-level coverage requirement that largely mirrors the federal requirement, with tweaks that tailor it to D.C.’s particular insurance environment and respond to recent federal policy changes. Last week, Mayor Bowser signed the requirement into law. By encouraging healthy consumers to enroll, D.C.’s coverage requirement would encourage market…
…complications were more likely to have an interruption in coverage than those with complications, possibly due “job lock,” the phenomenon of people with health complications avoiding job changes to prevent the loss of their job-based coverage. Why it Matters Research often focuses on the effects of “churning” in and out of Medicaid coverage, but much less is known about the…
…learn more about the final rule, you can read more here. Short-term plans are not required to comply with the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) consumer protections, meaning insurers that sell these policies can deny coverage to individuals with preexisting conditions and are not required to cover essential health benefits. These plans are typically marketed to healthy consumers, for whom coverage…
…in a world where insurance products come in a variety of shapes and sizes. An ACA-compliant plan, for example, limits the amount of cost-sharing imposed on an enrollee, and cannot set annual or lifetime dollar limits on benefits. At the other end of the spectrum, a fixed indemnity product will pay a fixed dollar amount for a very limited range…
…based in community health centers, hospitals, universities, and legal aid centers. They assist in enrollment, education, and consumer advocacy, aiding in appeals processes and resolving application issues such as income and proof of identity inconsistencies. CMS argues that Navigators “failed to enroll a meaningful amount of people” in 2017. This argument misses the point of the Navigator program. Like filing…
…publication for The Commonwealth Fund, Justin Giovannelli, Kevin, Lucia, and Sabrina Corlette describe the actions states are taking to promote access to affordable, comprehensive, individual market coverage. This work marks the launch of an interactive map that will continuously track these and other state policy choices likely to affect state individual markets. You can read the full publication here and…
…of Puerto Rican children, and 48 percent of all residents of the Commonwealth, rely on Medicaid today. Editor’s note: This post was originally published on the Georgetown University Center for Children & Family’s Say Ahhh! blog. Since its publication H.R. 6306, as well as other HSA related bills, were approved by the Ways & Means committee on largely party line…
…not clear when, or if, the payments under the RA program will resume. The insurers most harmed by this are those that are owed money because they have a relatively higher number of people with health needs enrolled than their competitors. And depending on the financial health of the company, the delay could have serious consequences. A small company without…
…minimum standard of benefits. Iowa’s Farm Bureau statute is making a bad situation worse for the state’s individual market. Thanks to a number of decisions by state policymakers and the dominant insurance company – Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield – premiums in the state’s individual market are higher than they otherwise would have been, and enrollment in the state’s marketplace…
The opinions expressed here are solely those of the individual blog post authors and do not represent the views of Georgetown University, the Center on Health Insurance Reforms, any organization that the author is affiliated with, or the opinions of any other author who publishes on this blog.
