Quote:
So state insurance commissioners still have the power to decide what plans
can and can't be sold in their states, but the bottom line is insurers can extend
current plans that would otherwise be cancelled into 2014. And Americans
whose plans have been cancelled can choose to re-enroll in the same kind of plan.
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This attempt on Obama's part to be "no drama Obama" will become the camel's nose for him.
It's not the particular "fix" that he proposes, it's the event of any "change" in the ACA, itself.
The GOP will attack with the fact that he changed it at all, and more changes will never be enough.
IMO, the salvation for Obamacare now lies with the individual State Insurance Commissioners.
The following is a taken from an interview with the State of Washington's Insurance Commissioner.
I sincerely hope others follow suit, just for the reasons he gives.
Washington Post
Sarah Kliff,
November 16
Wash. insurance regulator supports Obamacare — and rejected Obama’s ‘fix.’ Here’s why.
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Mike Kreidler has served as insurance commissioner in Washington state since 2000.
Kreidler, an optometrist by training, also served one term in the House of Representatives
and 16 years in the state legislature.
On Thursday, Kreidler was the first insurance commissioner to reject President Obama's proposal
that would give insurers and extra year to sell plans that do not comply with the Affordable Care Act.
He said, in a statement, that he was acting "in the interest of keeping
the consumer protections we have enacted and ensuring that
we keep health insurance costs down for all consumers."
Kreidler and I spoke Friday morning about his decision,
why he thinks it will be difficult for any state to move forward on the Obama proposal
and how he learned of the president's plans.
What follows is a transcript of our discussion, lightly edited for clarity and length.
SK: Putting aside policy concerns for a moment, did you think it would be
logistically possible to allow these plans that were initially barred from the market back in?
MK: If that did happen, they'd have a key interest in wanting to re-rate their products.
They'd be trying to do that when people were already signing up.
That's true for any state, red or blue, they're going to be challenged
to implement this without having a significant impact.
It’s too late in the game, certainly for the state of Washington.
The health plans themselves have said that, as you've heard from AHIP
How do you have one set of rules for some plans and another for others?
It would have been very challenging.
Health carriers in our state were not excited about prospects of this.
And the last thing I wanted to see was the market destabilizing or seeing
significant rate increases impacting the number of people signing up for health insurance.
All of those things were going to be compromised. It’s brought about a lot of consternation.
I strongly support the Affordable Care Act. I know the president wants it to succeed.
And I'm supporting the president by making the Affordable Care Act work in the state of Washington.
SK: How many cancellation notices have Washingtonians received?
MK: There are about 290,000 people in the individual market, and
all of them were sent out discontinuation and replacement notices.
Those notices we don't have authority to regulate, but we did ask the carriers
if we could see them and in a number of cases made suggested changes to them as they went.
There are people out there who are not happy with the fact they received those notices.
Not infrequently the carrier has identified a replacement for them that costs more.
What people don't realize in many cases, and we’ve worked diligently to fix this,
is they need to go look at other plans and what other companies are offering
to see if there's a better fit for them.
<snip>
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