Time for Targeted Health Insurance Legislation?
October 16, 2009 1:05 PM
The health insurance industry got a sweet deal in return for their agreement to support health care reform legislation in this Congress. They will get millions of new customers, and were able to take off the table in this Congress many other potential health care provisions that would impact health insurers, but could have significantly reduced health care costs. The Democrats worked to keep as much of their end of the bargain as possible, but in the Senate Finance Committees healthcare package passed this week Senator Baucus was not able to deliver as many new customers as the healthcare insurers and many Democratic leaders had hoped.
Considering the many other provisions Congress and the Administration could have included in the original package, the Senate Finance healthcare reform package is still a bargain for healthcare insurers. For that reason it is surprising that the insurers have broken the agreement by running the Medicare ads last weekend. On the plus side, the insurers' abrogation of their commitment to support healthcare reform legislation does create a wonderful new opportunity for the introduction of a supplementary healthcare insurance bill to create some additional healthcare insurance cost savings.
We suggest that Congress introduce another healthcare bill that would complement and follow the one now moving through Congress. That bill would allow healthcare insurers to compete across all state lines, direct a federal study of additional ways to increase competition/reduce costs in the health insurance sector, and (just as a backup), also prohibit preexisting healthcare insurance exclusions in the future. No doubt creative legislators and some of the folks at the White House could come up with additional provisions to reduce health insurance costs. They should title the legislation the "American Healthcare Insurer Payback" bill (AHIP).
This new package would also give the health insurers some additional legislation to focus their 2009 advertising dollars (and our insurance premiums) on, and the diversion would hopefully make it more likely for an amalgamation of currently pending healthcare bills to eventually pass. Since deals like the one made with AHIP are usually good only through one Congress anyway, this new complementary package would also give Congress an early start on working out the bugs and refining the measure so that it will be shovel ready for early serious consideration in the next Congress.
Considering the many other provisions Congress and the Administration could have included in the original package, the Senate Finance healthcare reform package is still a bargain for healthcare insurers. For that reason it is surprising that the insurers have broken the agreement by running the Medicare ads last weekend. On the plus side, the insurers' abrogation of their commitment to support healthcare reform legislation does create a wonderful new opportunity for the introduction of a supplementary healthcare insurance bill to create some additional healthcare insurance cost savings.
We suggest that Congress introduce another healthcare bill that would complement and follow the one now moving through Congress. That bill would allow healthcare insurers to compete across all state lines, direct a federal study of additional ways to increase competition/reduce costs in the health insurance sector, and (just as a backup), also prohibit preexisting healthcare insurance exclusions in the future. No doubt creative legislators and some of the folks at the White House could come up with additional provisions to reduce health insurance costs. They should title the legislation the "American Healthcare Insurer Payback" bill (AHIP).
This new package would also give the health insurers some additional legislation to focus their 2009 advertising dollars (and our insurance premiums) on, and the diversion would hopefully make it more likely for an amalgamation of currently pending healthcare bills to eventually pass. Since deals like the one made with AHIP are usually good only through one Congress anyway, this new complementary package would also give Congress an early start on working out the bugs and refining the measure so that it will be shovel ready for early serious consideration in the next Congress.
Leave a comment