US Supreme court ruling moves California forward with health care reform
The Supreme Court's historic ruling brought sighs of relief to California health officials. In the past months of uncertainty, they’d been bracing for a possible repeal of the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act, while at the same time facing looming deadlines for implementing several major provisions of the health reform law.
"This ruling makes it possible for us to complete the work that we’ve started and be ready in January 2014 to begin providing health security to nearly 6 million Californians who are uninsured," said Diana Dooley, secretary of the California Health and Human Services (CHHS) agency, which operates Medi-Cal and a number of other health programs. "We’ve had many starts and stops, and we are now in the full-go mode."
California was first in the nation to begin the complex and expensive process of creating a health care exchange program required and funded by the federal health reform law. The idea is to provide a state-run marketplace that offers a smorgasbord of private health insurance plans to small businesses and to Californians who don’t have employee-sponsored insurance. Low-income residents will get subsidies to help them buy insurance.
"We look forward to making the purchase of insurance through California’s exchange as easy as buying a book on Amazon and shoes on Zappos," said Peter Lee, executive director of the exchange. Lee says by October 2013, Californians will be able to compare and choose plans based on costs and benefits. "And we’re going to be moving full speed ahead to build this marketplace, to make it easier for all Californians to get access to affordable insurance," he said.
http://www.scpr.org/news/2012/06/28/33020/us-supreme-court-ruling-moves-california-forward-p/
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