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As the political drama over health care legislation in Washington fades, the rest of the country faces a more immediate concern: Getting insurance for next year. The Republican health plan designed to replace the Obama-era health law known as the Affordable Care Act would not have taken full effect for a few years anyway — and now it's dead. (3/25)

Congress choked. Obamacare lives.House Republicans are at an unfamiliar crossroads after their seven-year effort to repeal the law collapsed. The direction they and the Trump administration choose will determine whether Obamacare survives, or faces new threats as political opposition continues to simmer and flaws recognized even by its supporters go unaddressed. (Cancryn, Haberkorn and Pradhan, 3/24)

Friday’s collapse of Republican plans to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act has broad implications not only for the nation’s health care system, but also for the fate of President Trump’s ambitious agenda in his young and chaotic presidency. (Shear, 3/24)

LaRonda Hunter, a business owner in Fort Worth, Tex., views the Affordable Care Act as a literal job killer. Fearful of triggering the law’s employer mandate, which requires businesses with 50 or more workers to offer health insurance or pay penalties, Ms. Hunter has held off on expanding her small chain of hair salons. She voted for President Trump with the hope that he would quickly make good on his promise to strike down the health care law. (Cowley, 3/26)

Americans who have benefited from the Affordable Care Act are feeling some relief at the failure of Republican efforts to repeal it, but they face new anxieties with President Donald Trump tweeting that "ObamaCare will explode." Premiums have risen and major insurers have backed out of the state markets where people can buy insurance online under Obama's signature health care law. But people who say it saved their lives or helped them start a business want lawmakers to fix these problems, not encourage them. (3/26)

The AHCA was under fire from the AARP, a host of health care associations, physicians and leaders as well as the Council on Aging of Middle Tennessee for a variety of its tenets, but particularly the disproportionate impact the legislation could have on older adults and people who are low income because of how it would overhaul Medicaid. Tennesseans buying individual insurance plans under the AHCA would have seen an average increase of $5,709 a year, compared with a $3,600 average across the country, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The net premium for a 60-year-old making $22,000 a year could rise by $11,835. (Fletcher, 3/26)

Many health care leaders in Illinois cheered the demise of House Republicans' Obamacare replacement bill Friday — but it didn't take long for reality to quiet the celebration. Despite the bill's downfall, challenges remain in Illinois and across the U.S. when it comes to health insurance, they said. "We can stop and take a breath and regroup, (but) I wouldn't say celebrate because I don't think the work is over," said John Peller, president and CEO of the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. "I think everyone agrees, Republicans and Democrats alike, that the Affordable Care Act as it stands now is far from perfect and needs improvement." (Schencker, 3/25)

Relief, disappointment, unassuaged worry, political swagger, straightforward determination. From the state Capitol to the halls of academia, and from the interior to the coast, Californians reacted strongly on Friday to the dramatic news that the Affordable Care Act would be around “for the foreseeable future,” as House Speaker Paul Ryan conceded after being forced to withdraw the Republican repeal bill for lack of support within his own party. Here are some of the comments from policymakers, advocates and consumers around the state. (3/27)

With the stunning failure of the GOP to win support for its health care bill Friday, Connecticut Democrats increased their calls for reforms of the Affordable Care Act that would keep it alive... After having to pull the health care bill from a  scheduled vote Thursday, and then again Friday, House Speaker Paul Ryan, said the GOP bill was dead and,  “Obamacare is the law of the land for the foreseeable future.” But he predicted the Affordable Care Act would spiral into oblivion, saying premiums would keep rising and insurers would continue to abandon the state exchanges created by the ACA. (Radelat, 3/24)

AARP was one of dozens of groups that urged members to call their congressional representatives and urge them to vote no on the American Health Care Act (AHCA). The intense lobbying effort may be one reason House Speaker Paul Ryan could not muster the 216 votes needed and pulled his bill — leaving the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in place "for the foreseeable future." (Bebinger, 3/24)

Lourdes Flores Valdez says she got her diabetes under control after she was able to sign up for Medi-Cal, California's version of Medicaid, under the Affordable Care Act's expanded eligibility rules. Sitting in an exam room at the UMMA Community Clinic's Fremont Wellness Center in South Los Angeles, she suddenly veers away from discussing the health law and starts talking about her husband, who is in the United States illegally. (Plevin, 3/25)

While some parts of the law have obvious problems, others are working well and have brought the country's rate of uninsured people to a record low. (3/25)

The Department of Health and Human Services' (HHS) inspector general is reviewing the Trump administration's decision earlier this year to halt its ObamaCare outreach efforts. The review was initiated after Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) and Patty Murray (Wash.) requested the HHS watchdog investigate the administration's move in late January. (Vladimirov, 3/24)