MN Legislative Update on Obamacare Exchange & privacy-gutting bills

Please begin now contacting your legislators about the Obamacare Exchange bills which are likely to be voted on March 4 in the House and March 7 in the Senate. They want the final bill to Gov. Dayton on March 22.

Three Bills:

1) Minnesota Obamacare Exchange (federal takeover center): The bill has been rushed through the legislature. It is headed to its final committee in both the House and in the Senate. The bill could be voted on by the full House and the full Senate next week. However, the expectation is March 4 (House) and March 7 (Senate). After that, it must go to conference committee.

A major difference between the House and Senate bills is the funding. The House bill (HF5), authored by Rep. Joe Atkins (D-Inver Grove Hgts), uses a 3.5% withhold to fund $60+ million in annual operations (3.5% of the individual's premium is kept by the Exchange before the rest is sent to the health plan). The Senate bill (SF1), authored by Sen. Tony Lourey (D-Kerrick), uses the Health Impact Fee (tax) out of the general fund. . The Exchange is not a marketplace.

2) Gutting Minnesota Medical Privacy Laws: A bill authored by a Democrat and co-authored by a Republican will harmonize Minnesota's strong privacy laws with the federal HIPAA "no-privacy" rule. In other words, Minnesota will no longer be protected from HIPAA. We'll all be under HIPAA's lack of privacy protections. HIPAA allows 2.2 million entities to have access to private medical records without patient consent. That's a federal number!

The only good thing about HIPAA is that is allows stronger state laws to supercede the permissive disclosures allowed by HIPAA. That's why we've had stronger laws for a decade. But House File 824 will force Minnesota to follow HIPAA. House File 824 is authored by Rep. Melissa Hortman (D-Brooklyn Park) and co-authored by Rep. Jim Abeler (R-Anoka). As of yet there is no Senate author. No hearings are scheduled yet, but please prepare to come to hearings to oppose this bill.

3) Exempting MN Dept. of Health from Genetic Privacy Law:

House File 589 authored by Rep. Phyllis Kahn (D- Mpls) would exempt the Minnesota Department of Health from the MN genetic privacy law.

Last session the MN Dept of Health tried to get a complete exemption from the MN genetic privacy law because they feared another lawsuit like the Baby DNA lawsuit CCHF helped nine families file against MDH. The parents won in the MN Supreme Court on November 16, 2011.

Why do state health officials want an exemption? Because, just like with Baby DNA, there are all sorts of other biological specimens from individuals that MDH has taken and stored without legislative authority -- specimens NOBODY knows about.

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