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United States News Title: OBAMACARE UPDATE - 09 December 2013 OBAMACARE UPDATE - 09 December 2013 By John Schwartz and Katie Thomas [...] after President Obama said on Nov. 14 that insurers would be allowed to renew their plans for one year, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina announced that 230,000 of its customers in the state could keep their own plans — but at prices that rose 16 percent to 24 percent. Kathleen LeFleur, a broker who works with people who have individual plans at Employee Benefit Advisors, an insurance agency here, said many of the callers to her office had two things in common: confusion and anger. “They are confused before they call,” she said. “After they call, they’re not confused anymore. They’re angry.” [...] http://news.yahoo.com/insurance-website-healthcare-gov-error-rate-10-percent-195258816.html Reuters (Reuters) - The federal health insurance website HealthCare.gov is experiencing errors about once out of every 10 transactions, a spokeswoman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said on Friday. In addition, this online insurance marketplace for individuals in 36 states could have as many as 1 in 4 transactions with errors, CMS spokeswoman Julie Bataille said during a news briefing. http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/apnewsbreak-fed-site-unusable-medicaid-data-21113581 Columbia, S.C. December 5, 2013 (AP) [...] The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services wrote a memo to the 36 states using the federal website last week acknowledging the information wasn't being transferred automatically and saying another system was being developed to send it. More complete files could be sent as soon as next week. The technical problem could affect tens of thousands of Medicaid applicants [...] New files with more information could be sent as soon as Tuesday, Salo said. But states are unsure the new files will be complete or accurate enough for enrollments. "States that want to can take it as gospel and use the information to enroll people," he said. "But that sets up the question, how sure are we the information is going to be correct? Is hasn't been up until now. Can the state afford to just take that on faith?" Tony Keck, director of South Carolina's Department of Health and Human Services, said that so far his agency has been receiving garbled data that may include a name but no address or three digits from a social security number. "What they're sending us is essentially the same type of bad data they're sending the insurance companies, and we can't do anything with it," Keck said. [...] http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-c1-health-navigators-20131206-dto,0,2697366.htmlstory Quinetta Rascoe is working to sign people up for coverage under Obamacare in rural North Carolina, where lawmakers are hostile and many of the neediest people are skeptical and uninformed. By Brian Bennett Dec. 6, 2013 [...] Rascoe is one of thousands of foot soldiers hired nationwide to sign Americans up for coverage under President Obama's Affordable Care Act. [...] At the moment, Rascoe's the only person at the clinic who is dedicated full time to signing people up for medical coverage. Local organizations across the state received a total of $7 million in federal grants to train and hire 300 Obamacare counselors. But beyond a two-day online training course, a stack of government-issued brochures, business cards and a cellphone provided by the health center, Rascoe is largely on her own to come up with ways to find the uninsured. [...] During October, the month the healthcare exchanges opened, about 1,600 people in North Carolina signed up for coverage — only 12% of the number officials expected, according to federal figures. None of those were Rascoe's clients. Since then, she has completed the enrollment process with four applicants. [...] http://healthpolicyandmarket.blogspot.com/2013_12_01_archive.html Is Obamacare Responsible For the Recent Slowdown in Health Care Costs? Thursday, December 5, 2013 That is what we have been told the Obama administration will claim on Friday as they begin the job of reselling Obamacare. Is Obamacare even partly responsible for the slowdown in health care costs? That is silly. First, Obamacare is not a health care reform law; it is a health insurance reform law. No one on either side of the debate has ever argued anything different. Does the law have some limited cost containment features in it? Yes. But these are either pilot projects or are years from being fully implemented. [...] Perhaps the biggest, and most controversial, cost containment element of the Affordable Care Act is the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), which has the power to change Medicare reimbursement if costs are escalating at an unsustainable rate. But the IPAB doesn't even begin until 2015––the board members haven't been appointed yet. More, it appears that health care cost trend is now so low the board may not even be triggered come 2015. [...] Why are health care costs escalating at historically low levels? That is a question health care economists have been debating. No one is really sure. But at least three reasons are commonly listed: Clearly, there is a lot of debate over just what is causing the slowdown in health care costs. I guess that just creates an opportunity for eager politicians to find another thing to spin. Posted by ROBERT LASZEWSKI at 9:12 PM By: Jon Walker The Obama administration has been quite cagey and secretive about their problems with the back end of Healthcare.gov but the New Republic recently got a nice scoop. Apparently the error rate with the information sent to the insurers via 834 transactions is now down to only 10 percent. From Jonathan Cohn: That is technically a big improvement, but still a lousy error rate. Now it is clear why the administration has been keeping such a huge screw-up secret. Several million people are expected to buy insurance next year via Healthcare.gov so an error rate of 10% could theoretically impact hundreds of thousands of people. Of course the administration will continue to make real improvements to the system before more people sign up and the insurers are going to catch many of these problems as well, but it is likely thousands will be or have been negatively impacted by this back end problem. Anyone who already bought coverage via Healthcare.gov should check with their insurer to make sure everything is correct and in order. READER RESPONSE: I did atempt to check but BC/BS of Michigan told me that it takes eight days for them to process the information once they receive it. I explained that I was concerned since there were reports of applications not being transmitted, or containing incorrect information, so I was trying to be diligent. How could I resolve a problem effectively if I had to wait eight days to potentially start all over? My coverage had been cancelled and I wanted to make sure the new policy was in place Jan. 1. She chuckled and told me I could have appplied directly with BC/BS. I went on to explain I wanted to apply a tax incentive toward my premium. Another chuckle. (I decided to pass on making the observation that she was creating the impression the Blues was not interested in customers whose incomes were within 400% of the poverty level.) Next she said something to the effect of “Didn’t the exchange give you a confirmation number, or something”? “No, the web site said to write down my exchange account number that I already gave you.” “Oh. Well, call back after eight days.” Hello. I would have thought that since I was committing to send them checks just as large next year as the ones I had written this year (and for years going back) and they would get a substantial subsidy from Uncle Sam, they would be a little more willing to work with me. So, bottom line – at least if you live in Michigan – you still might be out of insurance and there is little, or nothing, you can do about it. Calling the insurance company did not ocnfirm anything and it certainly did not leave me with a warm and fuzzy feeling. I feel as if I am stuck in another loop. http://washingtonexaminer.com/doctors-boycotting-californias-obamacare-exchange/article/2540272 By Richard Pollock An estimated seven out of every 10 physicians in deep-blue California are rebelling against the state's Obamacare health insurance exchange and won't participate, the head of the state's largest medical association said. “It doesn't surprise me that there's a high rate of nonparticipation,” said Dr. Richard Thorp, president of the California Medical Association. [...] California offers one of the lowest government reimbursement rates in the country -- 30 percent lower than federal Medicare payments. And reimbursement rates for some procedures are even lower. In other states, Medicare pays doctors $76 for return-office visits. But in California, Medi-Cal's reimbursement is $24, according to Dr. Theodore M. Mazer, a San Diego ear, nose and throat doctor. In other states, doctors receive between $500 to $700 to perform a tonsillectomy. In California, they get $160, Mazer added. Only in September did insurance companies disclose that their rates would be pegged to California’s Medicaid plan, called Medi-Cal. That's driven many doctors to just say no. [...] http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CLF16OV Source: U.S. Department of Labor: Bureau of Labor Statistics 2013-11: 155,294 Thousands of Persons 2013-10: 154,839 2013-09: 155,559 2013-08: 155,486 2013-07: 155,798 Monthly, Seasonally Adjusted, Updated: 2013-12-06 7:51 AM CST From July 2013 to November 2013, the Civilian Labor Force went from 155,798,000 to 155,294,000, shedding 504,000 members of the labor force. Published December 06, 2013 Congressional lawmakers and staff are getting a hard lesson in the problems with the ObamaCare websites, as they run up against long wait times, technical failures and security issues with the D.C. exchange. The problems prompted the House chief administrative officer on Thursday to write the Office of Personnel Management urging them to take "immediate steps" to make sure lawmakers and staff can enroll. New problems emerged on Friday, with a Capitol Hill source drawing attention to an apparent scam in the system. The source detailed how, after telling the user the password was incorrect, the site directed the individual to a "forgot password" page -- which then asked for highly personal information. "On that page I was asked for my check card number and my ATM pin," the source said. "I was fairly confident this was a scam so I called customer service. After a 103 minute hold time, I was told that this was indeed a scam." This only adds to the pitfalls facing congressional officials trying to sign up, as they experience the same kinds of difficulties that other would-be enrollees encountered since the Oct. 1 launch. The administration says many of the problems with the federally run HealthCare.gov have been solved -- and enrollment indeed has accelerated thanks to improvements in the site -- but HealthCare.gov and locally run exchanges like the one in Washington, D.C., continue to exhibit problems. A message that went out to Senate staff on Thursday noted the DC Health Link site was experiencing "technical difficulties." [...] By Gabrielle Karol California residents who have signed up for health insurance on the state’s exchange to make sure they are covered on Jan.1 could still find themselves uninsured in the new year by no fault of their own. As many as 35,000 of the health insurance applications faxed in to Covered California, the state’s insurance exchange, have yet to be fully entered into the system, according to Sam Smith, president of the California Association of Health Underwriters, and the clock is ticking. In order to be covered by Jan. 1, Smith says California applications need to be fully processed by Dec. 23 and premium checks need to be postmarked by Dec. 31. FOXBusiness.com learned on Thursday that the ObamaCare exchange in the Golden State is scrambling to get faxed applications into the system and none of the applications have been submitted to insurance carriers. “These people who think they were covered may be in for a holiday surprise,” says Smith. He says Covered California had been instructing brokers and agents to fax in applications from the first day the exchange opened on Oct. 1 because the website was not yet fully functional. [...] http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/12/07/calif-health-exchange-shares-data-without-permission/ Published December 07, 2013 The California health exchange has admitted it has been divulging contact information for tens of thousands of consumers to insurance agents without their permission or knowledge in an effort to hit deadlines for coverage. Covered California said it was handing out consumer information as part of a pilot program to help people enroll ahead of a Dec. 23 deadline to have health insurance in place by the new year, according to the Los Angeles Times. The consumers in question had gone online to research insurance options, but didn't ask to be contacted. [...] By Jack Kelly Healthcare.gov No Longer a Complete Fail” was the headline on the story in Time magazine Dec. 2 on the rollout of the “new, improved” version of the Obamacare website. It’s hard to find a better illustration of the expression: “to damn with faint praise.” In November, Healthcare.gov was “up” just 42.9 percent of the time. According to the web monitoring firm Panopta, the lowest uptime rate last year for the websites of 130 major retailers was 99.34 percent. Healthcare.gov still crashes so often that the low bar the administration has set for “success” — that 80 percent of visitors could complete the enrollment process — may not have been met. Apparently, the site can handle no more than 17,000 visitors at a time — not the 50,000 the administration claimed. People should try to gain access during “off peak” hours, officials recommend. [...] Matthew Herper, Forbes Staff The Affordable Care Act has dramatically increased the cost of buying a health insurance plan on the individual market in California, Texas, Florida, New York, Illinois, Georgia, and North Carolina, states that account for more than half of America’s uninsured adults, according to a study by Sector & Sovereign, a sell-side firm that focuses on advising investors what sectors to put their money in. Worse, the firm argued in a note earlier this week, the increases in cost are most substantial for the young. According to S&S, the average deductible – the amount of money you spend out of pocket before your health insurance kicks in– for plans purchased by a 21-year old man in 2013 was $3,649, bought at an average monthly premium of $144. To purchase a plan with the same deductible now, a 21-year-old would have to pay $261, an 81% increase. For a 40 year old, the 2013 average deductible was $4,045, and the cost increased 29% to $309. For a 64-year-old man, the cost of a plan with a $3,494 deductible increased 64% to $806. [...] Kaiser Health News The Obama administration said Tuesday that more than 1.46 million people have been found eligible and signed up for Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program in October. Meanwhile, South Dakota's governor won't rule out expanding Medicaid in the future and Ohio lawmakers are poised to give themselves greater oversight of the program after the governor bypassed them to expand it. The New York Times: October Medicaid Applications Far Outpace Enrollment Through Exchanges [...] http://nypost.com/2013/12/07/the-medicaid-time-bomb/ By Michael D. Tanner The good news, if you want to call it that, is that roughly 1.6 million Americans have enrolled in ObamaCare so far. The not-so-good news is that 1.46 million of them actually signed up for Medicaid. If that trend continues, it could bankrupt both federal and state governments. [...] The Congressional Budget Office projects that, in part because of ObamaCare, Medicaid spending will more than double over the next 10 years, topping $554 billion by 2023. And that is just federal spending. State governments pay another $160 billion for Medicaid today. For most states, Medicaid is the single-largest cost of government, crowding out education, transportation and everything else. New York spent more than $15 billion on Medicaid last year, roughly 30% of all state expenditures. The Kaiser Foundation projects that over the next 10 years, New York taxpayers will shell out some $433 billion for the program. But none of these projections foresaw that so many of ObamaCare’s enrollees would be Medicaid eligible. [...] By Robert Pear WASHINGTON — For months, the Obama administration has heralded the low premiums of medical insurance policies on sale in the insurance exchanges created by the new health law. But as consumers dig into the details, they are finding that the deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs are often much higher than what is typical in employer-sponsored health plans. Until now, it was almost impossible for people using the federal health care website to see the deductible amounts, which consumers pay before coverage kicks in. But federal officials finally relented last week and added a “window shopping” feature that displays data on deductibles. For policies offered in the federal exchange, as in many states, the annual deductible often tops $5,000 for an individual and $10,000 for a couple. [...] http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303460004579192081764514664 How the Affordable Care Act raises prices and limits medical choices. Nov. 29, 2013 7:05 p.m. ET Even as President Obama reluctantly granted Americans thrown off their health plans quasi-permission to possibly keep them, he called them "the folks who, over time, I think, are going to find that the marketplaces are better." He means the ObamaCare exchanges that are replacing the private insurance market, adding that "it's important that we don't pretend that somehow that's a place worth going back to." Easy for him to say. The reason this furor will continue even if the website is fixed is that the public is learning that ObamaCare's insurance costs more in return for worse coverage. [...] By Alex Wayne and Alex Nussbaum There’s no way to tell how many people who think they enrolled for health insurance through the U.S. Obamacare exchange actually have, after about 1 in 4 files sent to insurers had garbled and incomplete information. The data transmission errors have been reduced to 1 in 10 since Nov. 30, the government said on Dec. 6. Still, the acknowledgment suggests consumers need to be vigilant about their health plan purchases. Letters from insurers confirming coverage can take a week or more, and the Obama administration now says people should call their companies if they aren’t contacted within that time. With repairs to the front end of healthcare.gov producing a spurt of 29,000 new enrollments in the first two days of December, U.S. officials are now focusing on what happens after customers select a plan on the website. Enrollment is incomplete until consumers make their first payment, which is due Dec. 31 for insurance that will begin on Jan. 1. “It’s time for people to move toward locking in coverage and paying for it,” said Joel Ario, a consultant with Manatt Health Solutions, in a telephone interview. Insurers will face “a tall challenge” trying to resolve enrollment errors as the time shortens before coverage begins Jan. 1, he said. The Centers For Medicaid & Medicare Services, which runs the federal health website, doesn’t have “precise numbers” on how many of the enrollment forms, called 834s, have been sent to insurers or how many have errors, Julie Bataille, an agency spokeswoman, said during a Dec. 6 conference call. [...] Scott Gottlieb, Contributor The President famously promised that you could keep your health plan and doctor. For many people, both of those pledges are turning out to be false. And now, you might not be able to keep your medicine, either. There are two reasons why. The first has to do with the higher out of pocket costs patients will face. The second issue may be even more significant. Simply put, many drugs may not be covered at all, and the costs patients incur by buying them with cash won’t count against out of pocket caps. This has repercussions for drug makers with big portfolios of specialty and primary care drugs (more on that later). But most of all, it has implications for patients. Drugs on your health plan’s formulary will typically have fixed co-pays. These costs usually count toward your deductible and the out of pocket and lifetime limits on the total amount of money that your health plan can ask you to spend. As the Wall Street Journal recently reported, these co-pays can already be substantial, pushing people quickly to their annual out-of-pocket limits — $6,350 for individuals and $12,700 for families (after which insurers pay the full tab). People whose annual income is at or below 250% of the Federal Poverty Level will qualify for cost-sharing reductions. (That comes out to families of four earning less than about $60,000, or individuals earning less than $30,000). But people qualify for these cost-sharing subsidies only if they enroll in a higher cost, “silver” Obamacare plan. [...] Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread |
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