From: GOPUSA
By Herald-Times (Bloomington, IN) November 15, 2013
A local expert on the Affordable Care Act said President Obama's promise that Americans can keep canceled health insurance policies for a year is virtually toothless.
"He can't order the insurance companies to do anything," said Chris Schrader of Schrader and Associates in Bloomington. "These policies have been canceled, and you can't turn on a time machine and restore everything to the way things were pre-Oct. 1. These canceled policies have been killed, and Obama cannot resuscitate them by putting the presidential paddles on them and saying 'Clear.'"
Schrader said in order for insurance companies to cover people whose policies have been canceled, they would have to create brand new insurance products and submit them to individual states for approval.
"Insurance is regulated on the state level, not the federal level," he said. "Every state has different laws, but in most states the average amount of time it takes to construct an insurance product and get it approved and ready to take to market is six months."
Schrader said even if the states and insurance companies fast-tracked the process and people bought the new policies right away, people would not be able to regain health insurance coverage until June or July.
"What this means is that even in a best-case scenario, people losing their health insurance on Jan. 1 would be exposed without coverage for six months," he said. "It's true that most of the people with individual plans are healthy, and for many of them the loss of coverage would not be the end of the world because they are less likely to need medical care. But many are not so healthy. Come Jan. 1 we will start hearing stories about cancer patients who've lost their insurance and can't get the chemo they need to survive."
He added that even if people are able to buy a plan on the marketplace by the middle of next year, they may be sorely disappointed.
"In New Hampshire, for example, there is only one insurance company in the marketplace, and that company's plans include only 10 of the 27 hospitals in the state," he said.
Schrader said there's another challenge Obama faces concerning his new pledge -- persuading insurance companies to write policies for less than a year in duration.
"Insurance companies are already screaming about the low number of enrollees (26,794 in the federally run marketplaces and 79,000 in the 14 state-run marketplaces)," he said. "They are not happy about those numbers, because they need lots of bodies, particularly healthy bodies, to maintain their risk pool. I would be stunned if any of them would write a policy and collect premiums for just 5 or 6 months before the policy is canceled. These companies work off actuarial tables and their policies are designed to keep people engaged for many years, with the hope that over the long haul their gains will exceed their losses and they'll make money."
Schrader said insurance companies are not only unhappy with the number of marketplace enrollees, but the demographics.
"Those who are enrolling are skewing old," he said. "Not many young people are enrolling and that is not good news for the insurance companies."
Schrader said the problem with the president's promise is that is seeks to provide a quick fix to a complex problem.
"The Affordable Care Act is not designed in a way that allows you to take a piece out of it and try to fix that piece in a vacuum," he said. "There are many factors that are interwoven and leveraged on everything happening in a certain way. Clearly the president and Congress have not read the bill or the regs, because what they're proposing can't be executed."
Schrader made a final point about the 106,000 people the White House says have enrolled for health insurance through the marketplaces.
"We don't yet have a crisp definition of what enrollment means," he said. "Does it mean they are in the process of enrolling or have completed the process?
"I can guarantee that the number of enrollees the fed has reported is not close to number of people who have selected a policy and made a payment," he said. "Many of them have simply placed a policy in their shopping cart, but the insurance companies are saying most people who've put plans in their shopping cart have not paid any premiums, and until you pay your first premium you don't have coverage."
God bless,
JohnnyD
By Herald-Times (Bloomington, IN) November 15, 2013
A local expert on the Affordable Care Act said President Obama's promise that Americans can keep canceled health insurance policies for a year is virtually toothless.
"He can't order the insurance companies to do anything," said Chris Schrader of Schrader and Associates in Bloomington. "These policies have been canceled, and you can't turn on a time machine and restore everything to the way things were pre-Oct. 1. These canceled policies have been killed, and Obama cannot resuscitate them by putting the presidential paddles on them and saying 'Clear.'"
Schrader said in order for insurance companies to cover people whose policies have been canceled, they would have to create brand new insurance products and submit them to individual states for approval.
"Insurance is regulated on the state level, not the federal level," he said. "Every state has different laws, but in most states the average amount of time it takes to construct an insurance product and get it approved and ready to take to market is six months."
Schrader said even if the states and insurance companies fast-tracked the process and people bought the new policies right away, people would not be able to regain health insurance coverage until June or July.
"What this means is that even in a best-case scenario, people losing their health insurance on Jan. 1 would be exposed without coverage for six months," he said. "It's true that most of the people with individual plans are healthy, and for many of them the loss of coverage would not be the end of the world because they are less likely to need medical care. But many are not so healthy. Come Jan. 1 we will start hearing stories about cancer patients who've lost their insurance and can't get the chemo they need to survive."
He added that even if people are able to buy a plan on the marketplace by the middle of next year, they may be sorely disappointed.
"In New Hampshire, for example, there is only one insurance company in the marketplace, and that company's plans include only 10 of the 27 hospitals in the state," he said.
Schrader said there's another challenge Obama faces concerning his new pledge -- persuading insurance companies to write policies for less than a year in duration.
"Insurance companies are already screaming about the low number of enrollees (26,794 in the federally run marketplaces and 79,000 in the 14 state-run marketplaces)," he said. "They are not happy about those numbers, because they need lots of bodies, particularly healthy bodies, to maintain their risk pool. I would be stunned if any of them would write a policy and collect premiums for just 5 or 6 months before the policy is canceled. These companies work off actuarial tables and their policies are designed to keep people engaged for many years, with the hope that over the long haul their gains will exceed their losses and they'll make money."
Schrader said insurance companies are not only unhappy with the number of marketplace enrollees, but the demographics.
"Those who are enrolling are skewing old," he said. "Not many young people are enrolling and that is not good news for the insurance companies."
Schrader said the problem with the president's promise is that is seeks to provide a quick fix to a complex problem.
"The Affordable Care Act is not designed in a way that allows you to take a piece out of it and try to fix that piece in a vacuum," he said. "There are many factors that are interwoven and leveraged on everything happening in a certain way. Clearly the president and Congress have not read the bill or the regs, because what they're proposing can't be executed."
Schrader made a final point about the 106,000 people the White House says have enrolled for health insurance through the marketplaces.
"We don't yet have a crisp definition of what enrollment means," he said. "Does it mean they are in the process of enrolling or have completed the process?
"I can guarantee that the number of enrollees the fed has reported is not close to number of people who have selected a policy and made a payment," he said. "Many of them have simply placed a policy in their shopping cart, but the insurance companies are saying most people who've put plans in their shopping cart have not paid any premiums, and until you pay your first premium you don't have coverage."
God bless,
JohnnyD
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