Millions will lose insurance in 2018 as Obamacare deadlines loom
As far back as February, officials at the state and federal levels were so concerned about the uncertainty roiling the market for non-group health insurance policies sold through the Affordable Care Act that they began pushing for the extension of deadlines insurers faced for setting 2018 premium rates.
The problem was that with Republicans promising to get rid of the ACA, it was difficult if not impossible for insurers to understand how to price policies in the insurance exchanges set up by the law. The possible elimination of cost sharing subsidies paid out under the ACA on top of the previous loss of other funding that the law originally promised threatened to drive insurers out of the exchanges altogether.
In February, when the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services began floating the idea of a delay in the deadline, some states demurred, expecting there would be sufficient clarity to enable insurers to set prices with a reasonable degree of certainty. Others, more doubtful, pushed deadlines out weeks and months, only to watch as worried insurers, still uncertain about what the Republican House and Senate would ultimately do, and whether President Trump would sign off on it, began dropping out of the exchanges.
Major insurance companies like Aetna eventually announced that they would exit the exchanges altogether. Others sharply restricted the parts of the country where they would do business in 2018.
Now, the final deadline is almost upon them, and those insurers who haven’t made their final decision must do so by next Wednesday. If they hoped that postponing that decision until the last minute might result in Congress delivering enough clarity to enable them to make a coherent business plan for 2018, well, they were disappointed.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/healthcare/millions-will-lose-insurance-in-2018-as-obamacare-deadlines-loom/ar-BBCMaql?li=BBnbfcN&ocid=edgsp
