MrHealthInsurance Blog

Update: On March 2, 2010, Congress passed, and the President signed a 2nd extension of the COBRA subsidy. The subsidy qualification period has been extended to December 31, 2010. President Signs COBRA Subsidy Extension Legislation Extends the premium subsidy eligibility period by two months, so it will end on February 28, 2010, rather than December 31, 2009. Extends the period of the 65 percent COBRA subsidy from nine months to 15 months. Establishes a transition period that applies to individuals who lost subsidies before the effective date of the Act because they received the maximum number of months of subsidies under the original subsidy provisions. Establishes new notification requirements by group health plans or other entities. Clarifies that eligibility and notice requirements for the subsidy are based on eligibility for COBRA due to loss of coverage because of qualifying event (involuntary termination of employment), both of which must occur during the eligibility period. Becomes effective as if included in the original COBRA subsidy provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

What I believe will be in the bill. No Cost Containment Some disincentive for those that try and beat the system, but not enough to change the economic decision of the individual to choose to try and beat the system. $50 billion in new taxes to be passed on to the consumer. No reward for staying insured. No incentive to obtain lower cost care. Elimination of Pre-ex. No change on provider discounts. A health insurance exchange to create new competition, but most likely won’t be competitive. “To heck with fraud”, lets just cut everybody. (sarcasm) – The government can’t seem to manage fraud, or even mount an attempt. They just will build in the basis that everybody cheats them, so cut everybody.

At 11:00pm Eastern Time,  the House of Representatives passed sweeping health care reform legislation with HB3962.   The vote was  ,  with    Democrats voting against Health Care reform.  

The bill, over 2000 pages, includes a Public Option.  An amendment passed tonight that banned Abortion coverage being included with any Public Option or private plan where federal subsidies are involved.  Rep. Jan Schakowski argued vehemently for abortion funding , but was unsuccessful in getting that ...

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Is Apple the big winner in Health Care Reform legislation?

As someone who dedicates their life to best serving the needs of clients and making sure that they are adequately protected from the "real" holes in insurance, I am completely overwhelmed by the amount of disinformation and villianization of the entire health insurance industry.   I am equally shocked by the general lack of understanding of how the insurance system works, even on the most basic level. 

There is a growing and disturbing amount of propaganda appearing in conservative and liberal publications seemingly for no other purpose to sell media.    The lack of research people of authority or influence conduct before weighing in with an, all knowing, summary is, in my opinion, inciting.    Over the past week, I have stumbled on to two enormous articles with, an apparent, intentional misrepresentations of facts and reason.  

Representative Joe Wilson summarized the lack of respect that exists in our country towards those with other opinions by yelling at President Obama “Lie” during his address to a Joint Session of Congress and the nation.  

While I am not prepared to offer commentary on a bill that has yet to be proposed, I would like to address the issue that Rep. Wilson addressed in that one word.   Rep. Wilson yelled when President Obama said that there would not be benefits for people here illegally.   The rudeness aside, was he right? 

The Senate Health Care Bill has not yet been published, but a summary of the bill has been leaked.   The bill is probably passable with minor adjustments and lobbying efforts.  It will likely get the universal support of conservative Democrats, even some Republicans.  Those numbers will probably be larger than the number of defecting liberal Democrats who will undoubtedly be against the bill.  (Having Liberal Democratic objection, even boisterous at times, is a smart political move to gain Centrist support.)

I have argued since the introduction of HR3200 that the reason for the quick legislation was not about true reform, but rather addressing two issues that can’t be openly discussed in Washington. (ref:  Why is this happening now, so quickly? Is there a secret? 7/17/09). Those reasons?  A tax increase and rescission of the Medicare Revitalization Act of 2003, MRA 2003 was designed to slow medicare growth rates.  

Here are the two items that start in 2010: