Reaction To Newly Signed National Health-Care Law
Source: Business Journal Central New York – March 29, 2010
By: Eric Reinhardt
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Some local stakeholders in the health-insurance industry, and at least one national advocate for small businesses, aren’t satisfied with the newly signed national health-care law.
President Barack Obama signed the $938 billion health-care bill into law on March 23. The legislation guarantees coverage for about 32 million uninsured Americans.
The signing followed a day-long debate and eventual approval in the U.S. House of Representatives on Sunday, March 21. And that came after a tough, yearlong battle in Congress on the matter.
In a statement issued on March 20, the day before the vote, MVP Health Care CEO David Oliker used the word “flawed” to describe the health-care bill that House lawmakers were considering at the time.
“Sadly, this reform plan will increase health-insurance premiums in New York state due to new federal excise and premium taxes without significantly reducing rising health-care costs,” Oliker said in the news release.
He also contends that New Yorkers already have the consumer protections built into the federal bill.
Oliker also has concerns about funding cuts for Medicare Advantage plans, saying the cuts would make the plans “unaffordable” for many older New Yorkers.
Schenectady–based MVP Health Care is a regional, not-for-profit health insurer for 760,000 subscribers in New York, Vermont, and New Hampshire. It has about 100,000 subscribers in Central New York.
In an e-mail statement sent March 23, Minneapolis, Minn.–based UnitedHealthcare said it is time for the difficult work of translating new law into practical, market-level execution.
The health insurer, which operates an upstate New York office near Syracuse, said it will apply its experience in serving 70 million Americans to help make expanded care a reality.
“We will also continue to advocate for, and contribute our clinical, technological, and health-information expertise towards, the more fundamental action needed to modernize health care and make quality care affordable and sustainable for all Americans,” the e-mail statement read.
Rochester–based Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, the Southern Tier’s biggest health insurer, did not respond by press time to a request for comment on the passage and signing of the health-care law.
At least one local insurance broker agrees with MVP’s Oliker about the concern over the new taxes.
The new taxes are a concern among all insurance providers statewide, says Christian (Chris) Marshall, executive vice president of brokerage services at Falcone Associates, Inc., an insurance agency at 901 Lodi St. in Syracuse that serves clients throughout Upstate.
Marshall also believes the federal government “rushed through” the process to arrive at a health-care law.
“You would think the people there would really want to dive into this and do the best thing for the people, and I don’t necessarily think that that’s what happened,” Marshall says.
He notes at least one provision that won’t have much impact on New York policy holders is the part of the law that expands eligibility for dependents on their parents’ policy up to age 26.
New York allows dependent coverage up to age 29, he says.
Marshall also believes a lot of people are just now beginning to understand what impact the new law will have on health-insurance coverage.
Premiums will continue rising, despite the passage of the health-care law, says Ronald (Ron) Wince, president and CEO, Guidon Performance Solutions, LLC, a Phoenix, Ariz.–based management-consulting firm that works with clients such as the Cleveland Clinic and the Mayo Clinic.
“The cost [of health care] is not even attacked at all in this,” Wince says.
Concern for small business
Changes that will take effect in 2010 include a tax credit for small businesses to help them cover the cost of having health-insurance coverage.
Wince’s firm in Arizona is a small business, and he doesn’t see tax credits for health-insurance coverage providing much help to the nation’s small businesses.
“I welcome any tax incentives, but it’s just not enough to really be a big winner for me,” he says.
A leading national advocate for small businesses agrees the tax credits to help pay for coverage are small consolation. “The legislation is more a tax bill wrapped up in health-care paper,” Susan Eckerly, senior vice president of the Washington, D.C.–based National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), said in a statement on the NFIB Web site.
“For small businesses, healthcare reform has always been about costs — reducing them. But the only thing this bill does is drive costs even higher. It will raise, not lower, insurance costs and it will increase both taxes and the cost of doing business for the very people they said they wanted to help — small business,” Eckerly said.
Besides the small-business tax credits, insurance companies won’t be able to drop coverage when a customer gets sick, and uninsured Americans and parents of children with pre-existing conditions will be able to purchase coverage.
But the health-care law doesn’t implement some reforms until 2014.
They include the requirement that most Americans have health-insurance coverage or pay a penalty. Larger employers must cover their workers or pay a penalty. In addition, small businesses and the uninsured will have access to a new health-insurance exchange for selecting coverage.
And Medicaid will expand to include 16 million additional people.
Just minutes after the president signed the bill, the attorneys general from 14 states filed a lawsuit against the federal government, claiming the health-care law is unconstitutional.
New York is not among the states. Most of the attorneys general involved are Republicans, according to the March 23 report from The Associated Press (AP).
The lawsuit includes language that claims the Constitution in no way authorizes the U.S. to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health-care coverage, according to the same AP report.
All contents © 2010 Business Journal Central New York. All Rights Reserved.
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