California Health Exchange Rejects Obamacare 'Fix'

[FarCenter]

In a major blow to President Obama's plan, California's health insurance marketplace has decided not to implement the White House's "fix" for people whose health plans have been cancelled.

As the biggest state with what's likely the biggest number of insurance cancellations -- 900,000, according to ProPublica -- the decision will hinder Obama's aim of giving those people the option of keeping their current health plan.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/covered-california-obamacare-fix-decision

Covered California boots plans that miss Obamacare standards

The board of California's health insurance exchange, Covered California, on Thursday decided not to allow insurance plans that do not meet Obamacare standards to continue operating in that state.

The move effectively rejects the fix President Barack Obama proposed to salve the deeply troubled rollout of the Affordable Care Act.

That state already faces an age-old health insurance challenge: The old folks are outrunning the kids in the race to sign up for California's insurance. If the trend continues, it might lead to higher premiums down the line.

People between the ages of 45 and 64 have enrolled in California's health exchange at a much higher rate than their overall portion of the state's total population, while younger adults' enrollment levels essentially track their overall population size, data released on Thursday revealed.

If the trend holds up, it could mean that insurance plans are overweighted with older customers, and underweighted with younger, presumably healthier people. Since their premiums are much needed to offset the cost of benefits paid out to sicker individuals, that could lead to higher premium prices in 2015.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101218932

California exchange rejects extension of Obamacare-canceled plans

California's new health exchange will not allow canceled policies to extend past the end of the year, defying President Barack Obama's effort to repair his pledge that people can keep their current plans.

The announcement on Thursday by the most populous U.S. state, an early supporter of Obama's Affordable Care Act, marked the latest state to reject the president's fix, which he announced last week after taking political fire for not keeping his promise to allow people to keep their plans if they like them.

Several million people stand to have their individual health insurance canceled at some point in 2014 because their plans do not comply with new requirements, such as coverage for mental health treatment and maternity care.

California also said that nearly 80,000 people had signed up for private plans through its state-run marketplace, showing momentum with its sign-ups at a time the federally run website continues to struggle with technical problems.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/11/21/21568067-california-exchange-rejects-extension-of-obamacare-canceled-plans?lite


California staying the course on expiring health plans

California's health insurance exchange has declined a presidential invitation permitting insurers to grant extensions to more than 1 million customers with policies set to terminate at year's end.

Covered California officials said they were leery of giving insurance companies more time to terminate individual policies that don't conform to the federal heathcare overhaul, or were obtained after its passage in March 2010.

Chairwoman Diana Dooley said she was troubled by the impact of the cancellations, "But fundamental mitigation is not possible," she said.

"If I thought for a minute that by delaying it we could solve some of the problems I would delay it," added Susan Kennedy.

Any decision at the exchange's board meeting Thursday would have been conditioned on working out separate agreements with 11 health plans.

Read more here: http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2013/11/holdpost-california-grants-temporary-extension-of-expiring-health-plans.html

[NYC_SKP]

1. More strategically negatively worded propaganda.

Give it 12 hours for a factchecked clarification of this latest manufactured crisis.

.

[cui bono]

2. CA embraces Obamacare as is!

[Pretzel_Warrior]

3. Honest question

Do you get paid to run this constant negative shit all over DU boards?

[JimDandy]

4. Perhaps

the OP's name should be FarRightofCenter? Don't know how he walks the tightrope he's on, but his rope may get too wobbly soon.

[pnwmom]

5. Balderdash! This helps the ACA rather than hurting it.

More people will then be likely to opt for the Exchange.

[Arugula Latte]

6. A sample of recent OPs started by FarCenter:

Interesting. Very interesting indeed.

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[LAGC]

7. Better Believe It or dkf?

[Pretzel_Warrior]

9. Somebody who's been here before. Style is somewhat like dfk.

[Arugula Latte]

11. Account was started in 2007, so who knows ..

[solarhydrocan]

8. Maybe she/he doesn't like Obamacare, even Obama didn't like Obamacare before he changed his mind

I supported Obama over Hillary because he didn't include a mandate to buy insurance and then he changed his mind.

Well I didn't "change my mind". Not supporting "Obamacare", for me, is being consistent, a concept that is becoming extinct. Not my problem.

Who's afraid of differing opinions? And who changes their mind to align with a politician?

Obviously many people here don't want any kind of debate, they want to cheerlead someone who has lied on multiple occasions.

I won't be supporting a Heritage Foundation plan no matter who peddles it. Period.

[bemildred]

10. We will follow VT into single-payer soon.

And I do look forward to having no insurance companies in my life, at all.

[MineralMan]

12. Minnesota is doing the same thing.

Announced this week. The state exchanges can do as they please, apparently. That's a good thing. States that couldn't be bothered to create their own exchange get whatever the federal government decides to do. Republican Governors are pretty moronic. In their vain attempt to block ACA, they screwed themselves and the citizens of their states.

In Minnesota, their exchange website had a few glitches the first week or so. Those were fixed quickly, and people are signing up and picking policies now in large numbers.

[geek tragedy]

13. This strengthens the ACA in California. Obama's 'fix' was good politics but bad policy nt