NBC NEWS: Obama Admin. Knew Millions Could Not Keep Their Health Insurance

Those insurance plans were mainly for decor. Now those folks might be able to find something worth buying.

NBC NEWS: Obama Admin. Knew Millions Could Not Keep Their Health Insurance

President Obama repeatedly assured Americans that after the Affordable Care Act became law, people who liked their health insurance would be able to keep it. But millions of Americans are getting or are about to get cancellation letters for their health insurance under Obamacare, say experts, and the Obama administration has known that for at least three years.

Q On your point, beyond the website -- the President, when he was trying to get the law passed, repeatedly said, if you currently have health insurance you’ll be able to keep your plan. This morning, David Axelrod was pressed on that point and said the majority, the vast majority will get to keep their plans. He no longer works at the White House. From that podium, will you admit that when the President said, if you have a plan, you’ll get to keep it, that that was not true?

MR. CARNEY: Well, let’s just be clear. What the President said and what everybody said all along is that there are going to be changes brought about by the Affordable Care Act that create minimum standards of coverage -- minimum services that every insurance plan has to provide so that an individual shopping for insurance, when he or she purchases that insurance, knows that maternity care is covered, that preventative services are covered, that mental health services are covered, that the insurance policy you buy doesn’t have an annual limit or a lifetime limit, that there are out-of-pocket expenses capped at a maximum level both annually and for a lifetime.

So it’s true that there are existing health care plans on the individual market that don't meet those minimum standards and therefore do not qualify for the Affordable Care Act. There are some that can be grandfathered if people want to keep insurance that's substandard. But what is also true is that Americans who have insurance on the existing individual market will now have numerous options available to them, and 6 out of 10 will pay less than $100 per month in premiums for better insurance. It’s not even an apples-and-apples comparison.

This is qualitatively better insurance coverage than what was available in many cases to Americans around the country -- in an area of the insurance market, by the way, that so lightly regulated that you often didn’t know what you were getting. So you could sign an insurance policy, get that plan, pay a lot of upfront money, premiums, out-of-pocket expenses, and then find out that because of the fine print, it doesn’t cover the actual condition that you have. That will no longer be the case.

So I get what the effort here is, but the fact is, is that --

Q Well, the President said one thing and you're admitting that that's not going to be the case, that not everyone is going to keep their plan; they will, admittedly, wind up probably with better insurance in the long run, so they may be healthier. That should be said. But the President sold it as if you have a plan, you’ll get to keep it. And that's not true.

MR. CARNEY: Ed, I appreciate what you're trying to do. Eighty-plus percent of the American people already get insurance through their employer, through Medicare, through Medicaid. They don't have to worry about or do or change anything. Those remaining individuals who do not have insurance at all now will have it available to them through -- or don't have insurance at all or get it through the individual market will now have insurance available to them through expanded Medicaid services in those states that have accepted the expanded Medicaid program, as well as through the health care marketplaces.

And it’s correct -- I mean, I take your point -- it’s correct that substandard plans that don't provide minimum services that have a lot of fine print that leaves consumers in the lurch, often because of annual caps or lifetime caps or carve-outs for some preexisting conditions, those are no longer allowed -- because the Affordable Care Act is built on the premise that health care is not a privilege, it’s a right, and there should be minimum standards for the plans available to Americans across the country.

Obamacare Is Already Forcing Private Insurers To Lower Their Premiums

By Sy Mukherjee

Looks like Obamacare is more “on track” than “train wreck.”

In a striking illustration of the promise that the health law holds for consumers, two Oregon private insurers vying to sell coverage on the state’s Obamacare insurance marketplace this October are reevaluating their opening bids for the plans’ monthly premiums. The reason? A side-by-side regional comparison of all proposed 2014 premiums for Oregon marketplace plans became public on Oregon’s marketplace website Thursday, and showed that the two insurers’ planned monthly premiums were far higher than other proposals. That raised fears among the companies’ officials that their plans wouldn’t be competitive on the market later this year, leading them to proactively request a rate reduction — and as more of Obamacare is implemented, state insurance commissioners expect that trend to continue:

“Posting rate comparisons company-by-company is a taste of what is to come,” says Cheryl Martinis of the Oregon Insurance Division.

Judging by the reaction, there’s already an impact.

Providence Health Plan on Wednesday asked to lower its requested rates by 15 percent. Gary Walker, a Providence spokesman, says the “primary driver” was a realization that the plan’s cost projections were incorrect. But he conceded a desire to be competitive was part of it.

A Family Care Health Plans official on Thursday said the insurer will ask the state for even greater decrease in requested rates. CEO Jeff Heatherington says the company realized its analysts were too pessimistic after seeing online that its proposed premiums were the highest.

“That was my question when I saw the rates was, ‘Can we go in and refile these?’” he said. “We’re going to try to get these to a competitive range.”

Although some insurers have been using Obamacare as an excuse to hike premiums despite record profits, such rate hikes have been rarer — and less extreme — since the law’s passage. And to emphasize, this is all happening before the state has had a chance to review and approve initial plan rates — much less launch the actual marketplace. After the exchange opens up, consumers will have even more detailed information about marketplace plans, including the ability to compare — not just rates — but actual benefits offered on the plans side-by-side.

That’s particularly significant because much of the current variation in health plan premiums stems from rampant health care price opacity and wildly divergent benefits offered on different health plans — a status quo that won’t last in the Obamacare era since the law requires qualifying insurance plans to offer a base level of ten “essential health benefits,” including prescription drug, mental health, and maternity services. That means that Americans will be able to go online and figure out whether a plan costs more because it actually provides more robust benefits, or because an insurance company is just trying to gouge prices and maximize profits. Insurance offered on the marketplaces will be separated into Bronze, Silver, and Gold plans based on how generous their offered coverage is, making consumer comparisons between similar health plans simple.

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http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/05/10/1994331/obamacare-forcing-insurers-lower-premiums/