Insurance

Health Insurance Corporations Planning Huge Increases

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insuranceHealth insurance companies around the country are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected. Federal officials say they are determined to see that the requests are scaled back.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans — market leaders in many states — are seeking rate increases that average 23 percent in Illinois, 25 percent in North Carolina, 31 percent in Oklahoma, 36 percent in Tennessee and 54 percent in Minnesota, according to documents posted online by the federal government and state insurance commissioners and interviews with insurance executives.

The Oregon insurance commissioner, Laura N. Cali, has just approved 2016 rate increases for companies that cover more than 220,000 people. Moda Health Plan, which has the largest enrollment in the state, received a 25 percent increase, and the second-largest plan, LifeWise, received a 33 percent increase. Continue reading the main story Related Coverage

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King v. Burwell Decision Changes Nothing For Obamacare Repeal

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courtJim DeMint – This morning, the Supreme Court handed down a decision in the case of King v. Burwell which maintains, contrary to the plain language of the law, subsidies are available to those who purchase insurance through federal health insurance exchanges set up for states which opted not to create their own. This doesn’t change the responsibility of Congress to repeal Obamacare.

Justice Scalia, joined by Justices Thomas and Alito, pointed to the farce of the majority’s ruling at the beginning of their dissent:

The Court holds that when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act says “Exchange established by the State” it means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government.” That is of course quite absurd, and the Court’s 21 pages of explanation make it no less so.

Nevertheless, the White House is quite pleased the court has stepped in to plug yet another “crack in the dam” on behalf of the administration. President Obama proudly proclaimed, “The Affordable Care Act is here to stay.”

Less enthused are the millions of people across the nation paying more for their health insurance because of the laughably misnamed Affordable Care Act, as well as those who wish they could have kept their old plans, as the president falsely assured them they would.

The six justices in the majority—Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan—relied on the puzzling reasoning that since the overall purpose of the law was to put people into insurance exchanges, a decision which struck down the availability of subsidies for those who purchase insurance through the federal exchanges would be contrary to legislative intent and thus undesirable.

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Insurance Companies Writing ‘Ebola Exclusions’ Into Policies

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“It’s a great time to run a pharmaceutical or insurance company in America – ain’t it?” – C Sarich

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Remember the promise of universal health care with Obamacare, with no refusal for ‘pre-existing conditions’? It looks like your insurance company may not have to cover you if you get Ebola. U.S. and British insurance companies have begun writing Ebola exclusions into standard policies to cover hospitals, event organizers, and other businesses vulnerable to local disruptions.

While it is estimated that expenditures to treat the original Dallas Ebola patient, Thomas Eric Duncan, were approximately $100,000 an hour (though he passed anyway), it looks like insurance companies won’t be footing the bill.

President Obama originally refused to set up travel restrictions in and out of West Africa, too, even though the governments latest scare tactics and the CDC’s ineptitude have resulted in insurance companies creating new policies which exclude Ebola care. Renewals will also become costlier for companies opting to insure business travel to West Africa or to cover the risk of losses from quarantine shutdowns at home.

Gary Flynn, an event cancellation broker at Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group Plc in London said:

“What underwriters are doing at the moment is they’re generally providing quotes either excluding or including Ebola – and it’s much more expensive if Ebola is included.”

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Charles Hugh Smith ~ Is Collapse The Only Real “Fix” To Our Healthcare And Legal Systems?

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“. . . most insurance companies have completely abandoned their fiduciary duties to both their insureds and to injured parties. Every single claim is treated as fraudulent. The discretion of the individual insurance adjuster has been largely removed, and they have a rigid set of guidelines set not on the actual injuries, but on a desire to maximize profit.” Randy

A few days ago I discussed the overlap of two bankrupt systems: Healthcare (a.k.a. Sickcare) and our legal system–malpractice. Today we hear from two correspondents on possible fixes to malpractice: Ishabaka (M.D.) and Randy, who combines both legal and medical expertise in his family: he is an attorney and his wife is a physician.

First up: Ishabaka (M.D.), a physician who has practiced medicine in both Canada and the U.S. and served an an emergency room doctor for many years.

My solution would be – first – a no fault system, where anyone who suffers an injury as a result of contact with the health care system is compensated a REASONABLE amount – like the workers compensation system.

One side of the story I didn’t mention is I have seen a case of clear malpractice where the suit was WON by the two doctors who prescribed naproxen to a patient for gout, when it was known he had a giant stomach ulcer. Every third year medical student knows naproxen can cause ulcers to bleed. The man woke up in the middle of the night with a massive bleed from his ulcer, and died. The thing is, there is an alternative treatment for gout – colchicine – that is perfectly safe in stomach ulcer patients, and should have been prescribed.

The second half of the system would be a really good review mechanism – I’d base it on the F.A.A. – that reviews what happened when a patient suffers injury due to contact with the health care system. I think in many instances, it would be found nothing could have helped – people get sick and die. I had a friend give a woman with no history of penicillin allergy a shot of penicillin for gonorrhea and she had a severe allergic reaction and died at age 21 – in spite of textbook treatment for severe drug allergy. Stuff happens. Continue reading →