Posted on 06/26/2017 10:41:17 AM PDT by GIdget2004
Senate Republicans on Monday released a revised version of their healthcare bill that adds a provision requiring consumers with a break in coverage to wait six months before buying insurance.
The Senate bill would make those who had a lapse in coverage for 63 days or more wait six months before obtaining insurance. (Read the bill here.)
The continuous coverage provision was noticeably omitted from the Senate’s draft, but aides said they were working behind the scenes to add it. The provision addresses concerns that people would only sign up for health coverage when they’re sick if insurers can't deny coverage for pre-existing conditions.
The addition of the six month waiting period could make it more difficult to pass the legislation, if the Senate parliamentarian rules the provision violates the complex budget reconciliation rules. Republican leadership was working over the weekend to make sure the provision complies with the rules and can be included.
It’s unclear whether Senate Republicans will have the votes to pass the bill, with at least five Senate Republicans on record as opposing the bill in its current form.
On Monday, Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) doubled down that a vote will be this week.
The Congressional Budget Office is expected to issue its analysis of the bill as soon as Monday.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
Solution to #1 - insurance is what it is, a policy bet against high cost low probability events over a relatively large risk pool.
Solution to #2 - lower the cost of care for preexisting maladies to 10-15% of their current cost by enforcing price transparency and anti monopoly law against hospitals, doctors and pharmaceutical companies. You can’t charge $60,000 for a hepatitis C cure you can get in India for under $1000 or $30,000 for an antivenin you can get over the counter in Mexico for $100. No more insane US pricing to subsidize the rest of the planet, and if another nation says if we don’t they’ll steal it and make it themselves beat them like a rented mule. Etc...
“If people cannot be denied coverage due to a preexisting condition then the government has to force people to buy insurance. As simple as that.”
Modern medicine is not so simple.
Let’s say I have an auto-immune condition such as rheumatoid arthritis (or a mental condition such as depression) and buy a policy.
Do I get to have the $2,000/month drugs after paying $400/month premiums?
No, I have to go through step therapy using the cheap medications first. Step therapy takes a long time, often longer than the policy term.
About the only times expensive drugs are needed in the first few months of a policy are for rare disorders such as for Gaucher’s disease or for some cancers.
There are some women who would need expensive breast cancer surgery in the initial months of a policy, but they can already get it paid for from the federal government if they go for their official diagnosis at one of many specially designated places.
There’s money for a state managed high risk pool in the proposal that could be used to provide some degree of bridge coverage.
None of this is the government’s business to legislate.
Insurance companies should be free to determine when they will sell what policies to whomever. E.g., the usual approach is for a company to issue a policy with some waiting period on specific preexisting conditions.
This government-mangled approach that will surely lead us to a fully socialized “single payer” will indeed dictate that people can’t buy insurance for some time if they are uninsured and the entire gist of this article is that the senate is indeed adding a penalty for someone not purchasing insurance.
All of my statements in my original post hold.
Totally true. No honest, thinking and informed soul would deny it.
Hitting the virtual Like button for your post.
The other thing that went unreported in all the hype about preexisting conditions is that federal law, in the form of the Kennedy-Kassebaum provisions of HIPAA provided considerable relief for those changing jobs or seeking individual coverage after being covered by a group. Those provisions required that the individual exercise some degree of responsibility (by maxing out COBRA and applying shortly thereafter) so they were rarely used. When I took early retirement, I failed underwriting standards but just pointed to HIPAA and they covered me with no exclusions.
Regardless of pre-existing condition, we pay for those that don’t pay for their insurance. That’s why I don’t mind people being forced to contribute something. I pay for mine.
Why should I pay for all of theirs?
When the uninsured didn’t have insurance before obamacare, we still paid for it .... higher healthcare cost, etc.
Must surely be a demand from insurance companies!
GOP Senate leadership must be replaced as well as Doc. Price if he OKed this abomination!
Notwithstanding section
16 2701, subject to the succeeding provisions of this
17 section, a health insurance issuer offering health in18
surance coverage in the individual or small group
19 market shall, in the case of an individual who is an
20 applicable policyholder of such coverage with respect
21 to an enforcement period applicable to enrollments
22 for a plan year beginning with plan year 2019 (or,
23 in the case of enrollments during a special enroll24
ment period, beginning with plan year 2018), in25
crease the monthly premium rate
AMOUNT OF PENALTY.—The amount de4
termined under this paragraph for an applicable pol5
icyholder enrolling in health insurance coverage de6
scribed in paragraph (1) for a plan year, with re7
spect to each month during the enforcement period
8 applicable to enrollments for such plan year, is the
9 amount that is equal to 30 percent of the monthly
10 premium rate otherwise applicable to such applicable
11 policyholder for such coverage during such month.
It’s not merely a cap, note the word “shall”.
That “shall” should be changed to ‘may’ and the “equal to 30 percent” should be changed to ‘up to 30 percent’.
The market should decide the amount, not some stupid RINOs.
Read the article folks.
But, but, but, then the government can’t control your life, as it now does!
But, but, but, then the government can’t control your life, as it now does!
No #NeverTrumper would deny it, apparently...
Yes, it’s a floor and it’s a cap. The market should be able to charge less as you point out. I don’t think that’s much to ask for and perhaps it will be one of the things Ron Paul et al will demand.
“I don’t mind people being forced to contribute something.”
What the Dutch do is to require people to:
1. buy true insurance
2. pay a special tax to pay for the high-cost, continual condition folks.
I merely offer the Dutch way as a possible political option.
As a person whose bank offers ~.08% CDs on my now badly depleted savings, I have to “mind” all monetary outflows carefully.
I simply can’t afford to enrich drug billionaires in Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco.
> We are talking about people who wait until they get diagnosed with a condition and then go out and buy a policy.
The problem is not people who are making an economically sensible decision, the problem is that someone exists who will actually sell a policy at a time when it is already a major guaranteed loss. That is the part that is not normal in this picture.
In the House bill, not in the Senate bill. The Senate bill requires pre-existing conditions be covered at the same cost for premiums as everyone else, though they allow for the possibility of some limitations, so there is no need for a high risk pool.
“Shouldn’t companies be free to negotiate with their suppliers?”
I don’t believe a massive retailer can legally muscle its suppliers to supply discounts.
At least that was the case when I was young.
Of course Wal-Mart is happy to get any that are offered.
What makes you think that is the case here?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.