Affordable Care Act Helps Real People in Real Ways
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Republican presidential campaign pyrotechnics can’t hide the record of a party that has turned its back on ordinary Americans. It’s worth remembering how, a year ago, the Republican-majority House of Representatives tried to repeal the 2010 Affordable Care Act.
What would have happened if they had succeeded?
- 2.5 million young adults would have no health insurance.
- 2.65 million seniors would have paid $1.5 billion more for prescription drugs.
- 24.2 million seniors would pay for preventative services they are getting for free.
And that’s just the beginning. A short report from the White House highlights how the Affordable Care Act is making insurance more available and affordable for millions of Americans.
It’s good reading at a time when the Affordable Care Act repeal is still a GOP battle cry, with all the presidential hopefuls and most Republicans in Congress vowing to overthrow the law—and trying to scare voters in the process.
Check out the Center for American Progress’ animated video (above) explaining the benefits of reform. The video was developed by MIT economist Jon Gruber, an adviser on both the Affordable Care Act and the Massachusetts health care reform program.
Health Care Reform Brings Coverage to 2.5 Million More Young People
Since President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law last year, some 2.5 million more young people have health insurance than before the law took effect, according to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).
Under the health reform law, children can remain on their parents’ health insurance plans until they turn 26, and families have flocked to sign up young adults. Says U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius:
Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, 2.5 million more young adults don’t have to live with the fear and uncertainty of going without health insurance. Moms and dads around the country can breathe a little easier knowing their children are covered.
BTW, this is the same health care reform that every Republican presidential candidate and congressional leader says should be repealed.
Blue Shield Delays Rate Hike After Nurses’ Protest
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How’s this for a demonstration of cause and effect?
Cause—Yesterday, some 200 activists, led by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United (CNA/NNU) rallied outside Blue Shield’s San Francisco corporate headquarters to protest the health insurance giant’s premium hikes of as much as 59 percent for California consumers.
Effect—Blue Shield announced a 60-day delay in the massive increase. Says CNA/NNU Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro:
It’s not hard to connect the dots here between nurses and patients turning up the heat on Blue Shield’s barricaded doorstep the same day it agrees to a brief reprieve in its egregious rate increase.
Kerry Abukhalaf, who brought her son to the rally, says, “Our insurance is completely not worth the price. We pay almost half what we pay for rent.”
California Insurers Reject More Than Quarter of All Claims
A new study by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United (CNA/NNU) finds that California’s largest private insurance companies continue to deny more than one-fourth of all claims and two firms rejected about 40 percent of submitted claims.
CNA/NNU Co-President DeAnn McEwen says the rejection rates show one reason why:
medical bills are a prime source of personal bankruptcies as doctors and hospitals will push patients and their families to make up what the insurer denies.
For the first three quarters of 2010, seven California insurance giants rejected 13.1 million claims—26 percent of all claims submitted—a number only slightly below the 26.8 percent rate for 2009. The data, new findings by the Institute for Health and Socio-Economic Policy, the CNA/NNU research arm, is based on data from the California Department of Managed Health Care.
New Health Care Rule: You Get More Care for Your Money
Big insurers spent millions to try to gut a proposed new rule that requires they spend a certain amount of premium dollars on actual medical care. But American families and businesses are coming out on top.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today issued a new rule—known as “medical loss ratio”—that will require health insurance companies to spend 80 percent to 85 percent of your health care insurance premiums on making you healthier instead of overhead costs like advertising or executive pay.
Last month, big insurers sent more than 1,000 executives and lobbyists to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) meeting in Orlando to try and get the rule changed, according to the coalition, Health Care for America Now (HCAN).
HealthCare.Gov Expands Consumer Insurance Info
If you don’t get your health insurance through work and are looking for coverage for you and your family, HealthCare.gov’s Insurance Finder has expanded the information available to consumers. The new tool offers detailed information on more than 4,000 private health plans from more than 200 insurers in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Launched this summer, the Insurance Finder not only gives you base price for these insurance plans, but new details like the percentage of people who are quoted a rate higher than the basic premium based on the individual’s health status.
You also can see what percentage of people were turned down when they tried to buy that plan. As Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius says:
This will give you some sense of how different insurance companies change pricing and accept or deny coverage for individuals in less-than-perfect circumstances. Until today, that kind of information had never been available to consumers, and this new transparency is the result of regulations issued under the Affordable Care Act.
50 Million Americans Lack Health Insurance
The nation’s worsening jobless situation, which played a big role in the increase in the current U.S. poverty rate to its highest level since 1994, also led to a big jump in the number of those without health insurance. The U.S. Census Bureau reported today that in 2009, some 6.6 million fewer Americans had job-based health insurance than in 2008.
Public insurance programs like Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), the insurance plan for children, along with critical provisions in the economic Recovery Act, mitigated the damage, so that the total number of uninsured Americans under 65 rose by only 4.3 million. All totaled, that means 50.7 million Americans now have no health insurance.
During a telephone press conference today, Elise Gould, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) said the share of non-elderly Americans covered by employer-paid health insurance fell from 61.9 percent in 2008 to 58.9 percent in 2009, three times faster than in previous years.
Looking for Health Insurance? HealthCare.Gov Can Help
Most union members get their health insurance through work, but if you don’t, or if a family member or friend is looking for health coverage, HealthCare.gov has a brand-new tool to help folks find quality and affordable care where they live.
And it’s real easy to use. Just select the state in which you live and your situation, then follow the prompts. Give it a try (on the left) or here at HealthCare.gov.
Say you’re a family in Zanesville, Ohio, that has health insurance through work. But when your daughter, a freshmen at Ohio University, turned 19 in January, she was dropped from your policy by your carrier. When you tried to buy a new policy for her, you were rejected because of a pre-existing condition.
The insurance finder tool gives you four options, including information on how to return your daughter to your policy under the new health care reform law and information about the pre-existing condition insurance plan that is also new under health care reform.
Or, if neither you nor your spouse have health insurance or any special health care needs, the finder shows that 18 health insurance companies offer more than 50 family plans in the Zanesville area. The site provides details of each plan and, in October, will have price estimates for each plan.
Netroots Nation: Young Workers—Taking Charge of Our Future
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| AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler (third from left) moderated the Young Worker panel with (from left), Sara Flocks, Maria Escobar and Cory McCray. | |
The nation’s economic crisis, lack of jobs and inability to pay for higher education are key issues for today’s young workers—and unions must focus on reaching out to them, panelists said today at the AFL-CIO panel, ”Young Workers: Taking Charge of Our Future.” Moderated by AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler, the panel at Netroots Nation included three grassroots activists who discussed their experiences in creating successful models for empowering young workers.
Shuler opened the panel by noting the AFL-CIO has made outreach to young people a top priority—young workers are the future of our nation, and their economic strength is the nation’s future. Yet even though young people need unions, they don’t know much about unions—they are less likely than in previous generations to have a family member or neighbor who talks to them about what being in a union means.
Obama Warns Health Insurers on Rate Hikes
Health insurance companies should not use the new heath care reform law as an “opportunity to enact unjustifiable rate increases,” President Obama warned today at a White House ceremony marking the 90-day anniversary of signing the landmark bill, which he termed “a true patient’s bill of rights.”
The warning came a day after a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) showed that health insurers are raising prices by an average of 20 percent for working-age adults who are not covered on the job and who buy their own policies.
