The number of uninsured Americans is rising. Last year, 27.4 million Americans went without health insurance, an increase of 700,000 from 2016, according to a just-published analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation. Government mandates deserve much of the blame. Regulations and red tape have driven premiums through the roof, pricing many Americans out of the insurance market. Nearly half of uninsured people cite high premiums and prohibitive deductibles as the reasons they aren’t covered. Free-market reforms would enable millions more people to afford insurance that fits their needs and those of their family.
What will Nancy Pelosi do now once she is back in the Speaker’s chair? In light of Judge Reed O’Connor’s recent ruling that Obamacare is unconstitutional and that the entire law must be scrapped, there is likely to be strong pressure to pass some sort of legislation to improve protections for people with pre-existing conditions. Of course, Rep. Pelosi also will face pressure from those who want to resurrect the idea of a public option—an idea she supported during the fierce debates of 2009-2010, but which foundered for lack of votes in the race to the finish line. And with various progressives jockeying for position in the 2020 race, there likewise will be a vocal minority urging a push for Medicare for All. To her credit, Rep. Pelosi has wisely desisted from endorsing that singularly bad idea. But it would be a shame if Nancy Pelosi squandered this opportunity by merely re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic. By now it is manifestly clear that Obamacare—like so many ambitious government programs before it–has massively overpromised and underdelivered.
The Health Care Choices Plan we developed would help the millions of people who are struggling to afford health insurance, particularly in the small group and individual markets, to have access to more choices of more affordable insurance while protecting the poor and the sick.
It is based upon formula grants to the states, using existing Obamacare resources, but with guidelines that incentivize states to provide people with more choices of more affordable coverage and even provide an escape hatch for people on Medicaid and CHIP to get better private coverage.
The November elections left us with a lot to digest—it wasn’t the decisive “blue wave” that some were predicting, but the tea leaves did tell us some interesting things about what voters believe and value, particularly when it comes to healthcare.
Interestingly, pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies found a notable phenomenon in exit polls: in races where Democrats won GOP seats, the number one issue was healthcare. Whereas in races where Republicans won Dem seats, the number one issue was jobs and the economy.
The blue ribbon for the Dumbest Tax in Obamacare goes to its tax on health insurance premiums, which the Joint Committee on Taxation estimates as raising $161 billion in revenue between 2019 and 2028. (The number would be higher, but for the fact that Congress passed a one-year premium tax holiday for 2019.) The problem is this: Health insurers aren’t in the business of going broke. So they pass along the cost of the tax in the form of higher premiums for consumers. According to estimates developed by consultants at Oliver Wyman, for every dollar Washington raises in taxes, premiums go up by around $1.27.
Humana’s shift from fee-for-service medicine to value-based payments for physicians continues to reduce costs and improve quality of care for seniors enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans, the insurer says, citing a new internal study. Medical costs were nearly 16% lower for seniors enrolled in Humana Medicare Advantage plans that paid physicians via value-based models in 2017 compared to costs of those in traditional fee-for service Medicare, the Louisville-based insurer’s study, released Tuesday showed. Medicare Advantage plans contract with the federal government to provide extra benefits and services to seniors, such as disease management and nurse help hotlines, with some even providing vision and dental care and wellness programs.
The United Kingdom’s National Health Service, which celebrated its 70th anniversary on July 5, is imploding. Vacancies for doctor and nurse positions have reached all-time highs. Patients are facing interminable waits for care as a result. This August, a record number of Britons languished more than 12 hours in emergency rooms. In July, the share of cancer patients who waited more than two months to receive treatment soared. Yet enthusiasm for government-run, single-payer health care continues to build in the U.S. One look across the Atlantic, to the disaster unfolding in the U.K.’s government-run healthcare system, ought to curb that enthusiasm.
Uninsured individuals, people between jobs, recent graduates, and new retirees, among others, now have access to affordable short-term plans. These plans—an opportunity that arose from flexibility granted with new federal rules—allow Americans to purchase health plans they can afford and are right for them. There will be thousands of new options on the market (see this new analysis for more detail and data), giving Americans something they haven’t had in years: choice of health insurance and carrier. By contrast, for an individual on the exchange, in a majority of U.S. counties, only one insurer is offering plans. The data also show that these choices cost significantly less for someone that is uninsured than plans on the individual market.
Amgen announced on Wednesday it is creating much lower pricing categories for its innovative biologic, Repatha, reducing the list price by 60%—from the current $14,600 to $5,850 a year. Patients who pay a share of the list price through co-insurance can see immediate savings. The company says it hopes that insurers will see the value of adjusting their formulary tiers to include the drug and make it more accessible and affordable to patients. The list price cut is a market-based approach that is much more likely to succeed in lowering drug prices while allowing investments in research for new innovative therapies to continue.
A few states have found a key to undoing some of Obamacare’s damage to their individual health insurance markets by redirecting some federal funding to help sick people. These states are providing separate assistance to those with the highest health costs, thereby reducing premiums and increasing enrollment for healthy people driven out of the market by soaring costs.