Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Final Push Underway For Obamacare Sign-Ups
The White House, in partnership with health advocacy groups, has targeted Asian Americans in an aggressive campaign to boost enrollment under the Affordable Care Act by Feb.15. (Guillermo, 1/29)
Roughly two weeks remain to sign up for health insurance on the marketplace set up under the Affordable Care Act, and this year the penalty for not having coverage will have a bit more bite. The minimum penalty will be $325, up from $95 for last year, and most people will face higher penalties. (Boulton, 1/29)
Insurance giant Anthem Blue Cross leads Obamacare enrollment in California, but Kaiser Permanente is gaining on its archrival. Anthem Inc., the nation's second-largest health insurer, has signed up 353,635 people, or 29.1 percent of Covered California enrollment through Jan. 15. That figure includes 2014 renewals and new enrollees since November. (Terhune, 1/29)
After the insurance exchanges set up under the Affordable Care Act first went live in late 2013, Lori Lomas started combing the website of Covered California on a hunt for good deals for her clients. Lomas is an agent at Feather Financial, in the Sierra Nevada mountain town of Quincy, California; she鈥檚 been selling health policies in rural communities for more than 20 years. But in 2013, she noticed a troubling change that surprised her: For many clients, insurance options decreased. (Bartolone, 1/30)
With open enrollment for health insurance ending in just two weeks, the push is on to get everyone who qualifies signed up. But some of the uninsured are balking, and it鈥檚 not only the so-called 鈥測oung invincibles鈥 who think they don鈥檛 need it. Gary Babcock of Clearwater, for example, is neither young nor invincible. He鈥檚 55, with diabetes so severe he has to give himself daily insulin shots and he could choose from several Affordable Care Act plans with no premium, fully subsidized. But he didn鈥檛 sign up last year and won鈥檛 enroll this year either, he said, because he gets everything through the St. Petersburg Free Clinic 鈥 drugs, supplies, checkups and classes on diabetes management. (Gentry, 1/29)
Colorado health exchange officials admitted late Tuesday that they canceled 3,615 insurance plans that should have been automatically renewed after a blistering report about the glitch on 9News. (Kerwin McCrimmon, 1/29)
In Florida, meanwhile, business leaders are leading the push for Medicaid expansion 聽-
Florida's Legislature has twice turned down proposals to provide health insurance for nearly 1 million state residents. And the new House Speaker on Wednesday said he had 鈥渘o plans鈥 to expand Medicaid for the people caught in the so-called coverage gap. But still state business leaders 鈥 and some mayors 鈥 continue to rally and aim to take another swing at it when the Legislature convenes March 3. (Shedden, 1/29)