States Grapple With Changes in Health Care
- Posted on October 5, 2010 at 4:54pm by
Meredith Jessup
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According to the Des Moines Register, 21,000 Iowa residents last week received notice that their health care insurers plan to drop their Medicare Advantage plans in 2011.
Medicare Advantage allows Iowa seniors to receive health insurance benefits via a private company instead of directly through the government’s Medicare program. Iowa’s Senior Health Insurance Information Program told the Register that insurers across the state were required to notify members by Saturday if they no longer planned to provide such plans.
Those residents who received notice that their plans will be terminated now must choose whether to enroll in a different program or return to the original Medicare program.
“You are still in the Medicare program no matter what you choose,” said Kris Gross, director of the state senior health insurance program.
Gross said companies decide annually whether to renew their Medicare Advantage plans. The decisions are driven by a myriad of factors, she said, including changes in federal law and market and business needs. …
Gross said Iowans should consider joining a prescription drug plan if they return to original Medicare.
Next year, Iowa will have 13 fewer stand-alone Medicare prescription drug plans, the state said. About 1,230 Iowans were notified last week their prescription drug plans would not be renewed.
In Arizona, the state’s Medicaid agency has announced it will no longer cover some “non-experimental” organ transplants, including liver transplants for patients with Hepatitis C. CNSNews.com reports:
In a memo announcing a number of benefits changes for adults 21 and older, the state’s Medicaid agency said it was responding to “significant fiscal challenges facing the State and substantial growth in the Medicaid population.”
As of October 1, the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System will no longer pay for liver transplants for patients with Hepatitis C; certain heart and bone marrow transplants; or lung and pancreas transplants.
The new transplant exclusions took effect Friday as part of broader Medicaid coverage changes mandated by the State of Arizona in response to budgetary pressures. …
In addition to eliminating most organ-transplant coverage, Arizona’s Medicaid agency also is eliminating most dental care for adults as well as coverage of podiatrist services; insulin pumps; percussive vests; bone-anchored hearing aids; cochlear implants; orthotics; gastric bypass surgery; certain durable medical equipment; “well” medical checkups; some non-emergency medical transportation; microprocessor-controlled lower limbs and joints; and it is limiting outpatient physical therapy to 15 visits per contract year.
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Comments (45)
sWampy
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 11:03amEveryone offering these plans but AARP will drop them, AARP will swoop in and save the day with much higher priced plans. It’s sad they used old peoples money to lobby for a plan that will take years off their lives, and reduce their kids inheritance significantly.
Report Post »camber617
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 3:24amAlso, as of October 1, Arizona’s Medicaid — AHCCCS — has started charging its members copays at the pharmacy. This is unprecedented.
Report Post »SummerB
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 1:13amFirst, this is Medicaid changes. In order to cover everyone, of course, they have to cut current coverage. The add’l. Medicaid enrolles will be glad for whatever coverage they get & the ones currently on Medicaid will lose existing benefits. Personally, I don’t think the majority of life-long Medicaid recipients vote anyway.
Report Post »SummerB
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 1:27amAs far as Medicare is concerned, the retiree will do just as well under Medicare as Medicare Advantage, however, we have yet to see what the Medicare changes/cuts will be.
Already 3M has notified it’s retirees that they will be discontinuing their plans, but will be giving them a stipend to purchase their own insurance through the exchanges in 2013. So much for being able to keep your existing insurance, huh? Unfortunately, since the exchanges are not set up yet, the employees have no idea what their insurance plans will look like. And the news story said that each state will be setting up their own individual insurance guidelines. Didn’t know this.
And you can’t blame the insurance companies for raising rates now that they have to insurance kids up to 26 on their parents policies & insurance people with existing health problems. It’s just business.
Report Post »MrButcher
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 10:43pmget ready for the shyt to hit the fan—my family’s rates just went up recently. to be fair, i do have extenuating cirumstances (my wife had a baby in july)–but they went up BIG TIME.—maybe we need another company….what do those 2,000 pages of the healthcare bill really say???? but maybe it is just bad timing.—-ah, screw it! if it comes down to survival, we’ll be fine. we can live off birds, squirels, fish, wild berries and what ever we can grow.—-those greenies with their gardens in our posh left-wing neighborhood better watch out.—-i almost think the collapse of our society will be a good thing. or, at least, interesting….be kind.
Report Post »mrsclark
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 7:22pm“You can keep your plan if you like it…” Barack Hussein Obama. Also, how many times have we heard “Medicare for all!!” Well, this is what you get with “Medicare for All!!!” Hey wait a minute, when the government decides to cut out coverage for organ transplants, wouldnt you call that a “death panel”?
Report Post »pinnybogg
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 7:14pmBut but but if we like our plans we can keep them right??????? Not!!!!!!!!!!!!
Report Post »BigOz1934
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:47pmThe states are not the only ones. Big companies that have traditionally provided health care benefits to retirees, are now going to cut back and let the retirees go into obamacare. They will provide a supplemental payment to help pay for this, but the retiree will have to find a Dr. that will accept this type of payment and care. What is happening to our Sr.’s will be happening to all of us with this “you have to pass it to find out what is in it” care.
Report Post »CoFX
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:32pmAh, Hope and Change in action.
Report Post »Sledgehammer
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:28pmSome times we get what we need, some times we get what we deserve.
Report Post »jagr1850
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:14pmCAN‘T WAIT TILL O’DUMMY RESIGNS IN DISGRACE……betting for it to happen very soon…..
Report Post »carol m
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 10:11pmDon’t count your chickens before they are hatched. He is going nowhere. When it fails he will either blame GW or the Tea Partiers and continue as usual. In fact when he gets voted out in 2012, my feeling is that he is not going without a fight.
Report Post »KL
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:54pmMore seniors voted for Obama, OH WELL.
Report Post »outwest
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:32pmWe must hang together in November, or we will surely hang separately. It may be a slow, painful, hanging but it will be a hanging none the less.
Report Post »Only1King
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:31pmAnd you can keep your plan if you like it….
Report Post »Obama
M-O-O-N Spells Moon
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:26pmIt’s almost amusing to hear people sound surprised by rising insurance costs and drop coverage since ObamaCare passed. I would laugh if I weren’t already weeping for the future my son will be forced to live in if we fail.
Step 1: Vote
Step 2: Monitor the voting records of those we elect
Step 3: Let them know we are watching them even if they are the ones we chose for the job
Step 4: Stay involved and informed
If this doesn’t work, well, a shack in the mountains with a lot of food and ammo is starting to sound pretty good.
Report Post »Okpulot Taha
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:34pmM-O-O-N SPELLS MOON comments, “…people sound surprised by rising insurance costs and drop coverage since ObamaCare passed.”
This cannot be true. Obama promised us health care costs would go down and all would enjoy health care coverage, including illegal aliens. The Black Messiah would never lie to us.
Okpulot Taha
Report Post »Choctaw Nation
FoBoT
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:34pmthanks for the reminder, i‘ll be stopping at the Bass Pro Shop on the way home for some more shotgun shells and MRE’s
Report Post »Okpulot Taha
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:23pm“Health plans in at least four states have announced they‘re dropping children’s coverage just days ahead of new rules created by the healthcare reform law, according to the liberal grassroots group Health Care for America Now (HCAN).”
http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/119823-insurers-drop-childrens-insurance-plans-ahead-of-new-rules
Okpulot Taha
Report Post »Choctaw Nation
tomika18
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:22pm29 more days to go. All Washington a-holes should start packing now.
Report Post »BornOkTheFirstTime
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:19pmFOBOT- You’re on it 100%. Not a conspiracy theory, folks. This was part of the plan from the get-go. Any good conservative saw this coming a looooong time ago.
Report Post »wingedwolf
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:11pmEveryone was warned. And damn Andy Griffith to hell for doing all those commercials for Obama’s medical takeover debacle. This is only the beginning. Remember the death panels? Read the bill. Our old friend Andy won’t talk about those, either.
Report Post »BornOkTheFirstTime
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:22pmFor those that don’t believe, look into H.R. 3200 sec.1233. Read it and weep. No pun intended. And GREAT point regarding Griffith, WingedWolf. I was just pointing that out to my wife the other day.
Report Post »wingedwolf
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:34pmThanks, Born, & thanks for reading the bill. The bane of my existence since april when this law became a law is being confronted by people who haven’t read the bill who are defending it.
Report Post »GnomeChomsky
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:56pmAnd how does that amount to death panels?
Report Post »Awakenow
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:10pmObama care was never about healthcare it still is about control and redistribution.Why waste time debating it‘s strengths and weaknesses it will achieve it’s goal if we do not stop it and that is to take your freedom and use it as they decide!
Report Post »broker0101
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:09pmOnce again, Obamacare continues to work AS DESIGNED. The next step to listen for is, “The private sector/free market has failed.”, which leads to, the “solution” of “Single Payer, Universal Health Care”, which, of course, is the ultimate goal.
Report Post »Waiting4George
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:07pmDidn’t Iowa go for O? Thank your fellow Iowans…
Report Post »nccmommy
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:33pmGood point.
Report Post »Beckster2
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:01pmThe state control over your life or death decisions begins.
Report Post »GnomeChomsky
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:45pmAs opposed to a profit driven insurance company employee making the decisions
Report Post »Post-Progressive American
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 5:33amProfit-driven, free market insurance companies and employees over Government control, massive bureaucracy and apathetic Government employees? Any day.
I was in an HMO once…as close to socialized medicine as I ever want to be. Sure, it offered good coverage at a comparable cost (to the fee-for-service plans), but the problem was you could never get in to use the coverage. Excessive use (abuse if you prefer) resulted in long waits to see doctors (up to 6 weeks), so most people saw the Physician’s Assistants (PAs) since it was only a two week wait. For anything more pressing, they sent you to the emergency room. Of course, 8 hour waits in the ER was ridiculous, too. I switched plans as quickly as I could.
Keep your socialism and I’ll keep my free market.
Report Post »Make the Stupid People Shut Up
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:01pmAsk your Congressperson if they read the ObamaCare Bill before they voted on it. If they didn’t, throw the dirtbags out in Nov. If they did, throw the dirtbags out in Nov.
Report Post »Like Thomas Sowell said, they never think past the first step.
Venom
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 4:59pmSo, government…..are you regretting this yet, since businesses and states are now dropping plans?
Report Post »FoBoT
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:12pmthis is the plan, we all either lose or can’t afford our plans, so the govt. has to step in with the single payer system to ‘save the day’
Report Post »it is all part of the plan
Bob_R_OathKeeper
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:55pmFOBOT is right on, it’s cheaper for them to drop the coverage and pay the fine, which is what most will due and then you have to go the government or you too must pay a fine. All I know is the clusterf@#$ better get fixed after Nov. 2nd. Semper Fi.
Report Post »Psychosis
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 4:58pmCant wait for NOVEMBER
Report Post »cubber
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:04pmAmen.
Report Post »staythecourse
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:38pmThis is all part of the “plan”. When I read the health care bill the first time around I was shocked.. it is so obvious that the entire thing is set up not about health care or coverage but for the entire collapse of the private insurance industry as well as the entire medical system. The law is actually working exactly the way it was planned. It is not at all about the economics of coverage…except about how to bring about the collapse of an industry. It is all about “control”.
Report Post »solaveritas
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 5:43pmThank God for Socialist stupidity. They set the deadline for giving the bad news to citizens just 30 days before the next election!!!!
Report Post »RONALDREAGAN1980
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:28pmAll these cry babies whining about illnesses that the health insurance companies won’t pay for. We need to get rid of all health insurance, public and private. Only then will healthcare be the bastion of the rich. If the poor were meant to be healthy, they would have been made that way.
Report Post »Major Infidel
Posted on October 5, 2010 at 6:57pmAnd it begins.
Cool, complete anarchy in 3-2-1 ?
Well, maybe not yet but I’ll be over here waiting anxiously.
Report Post »camber617
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 3:23amAHCCCS, Arizona’s Medicaid, is also now charging some of its members copays at the pharmacy. This is unprecedented.
Report Post »Marcobob69
Posted on October 6, 2010 at 11:56am“We have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it”. We are now starting to find out what Pelosi meant when she said that. Seniors especially will absolutely LOVE finding out the contents of this obscenity, oops I mean Obamacare, foisted on the American public by our ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES in control of Congress. I hope EVERYONE remembers what Congress did come November 2nd. Stimulus=FAILED, Bail-outs=FAILED, Obamacare=FAILED, etc etc!!! Do you really want more of the same???
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