Democrats' strategy for merging health care reform bills began to unravel under growing attacks Wednesday, including unexpected criticism from Colorado's two Democratic senators.
Final negotiations on merging the bills began in earnest Wednesday as congressional leaders spent more than eight hours behind closed doors at the White House using a process that bypasses a formal conference committee and cuts out Republican participation.
They dug into a series of sticky issues that separate the two versions of the bill passed by the House and the Senate — including abortion, access to health insurance by illegal immigrants, and how to pay for the sweeping legislation, which will insure an estimated 37 million Americans over the next decade.
Following the election of Republican Scott Brown to the Massachusetts State Senate last week and the resulting loss of Senate Democrats' supermajority, lawmakers continue to pave the way for health care reform - with limited progress. In addition, polls indicate that the public would rather lawmakers focus more on the economy than on health care.
COLORADO: Among the numerous grants available under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is the Consumer Assistance Grant, which would allow Colorado to set up an Insurance Ombudsman Office. Although no state agencies have indicated an interest in housing such a position, several consumer groups see this as an opportunity to broaden their impact on the insurance process. Family Voices Colorado is the one organization that appears to meet most of the grant requirements to be a lead agency. Despite the advocates' interest, the Health Reform Implementation Board expressed serious concerns about the financial sustainability of such an office. The grant funding is only available for one year, and the state does not have sufficient resources in its general fund. The Implementation Director also noted that a carrier assessment was not being viewed as an option.
CONNECTICUT: The House of Representatives last week joined the Senate in overriding the Governor's veto of their campaign finance overhaul bill. However, there's still an injunction in force that was imposed by U.S. District Court Judge Stefan Underhill on August 11 against all portions of Connecticut's law that were deemed unconstitutional by the Second Circuit. It is expected that the state will swiftly file a motion for relief from the injunction. Campaign finance law in Connecticut will not move forward until the District Court lifts its injunction, as anticipated, in the coming weeks.
OKLAHOMA: At a recent hearing before Oklahoma Supreme Court Referee Barbara Swimley, an attorney for state Insurance Commissioner Kim Holland challenged a new law that will levy a 1 percent fee on health care claims. Holland's attorney described the bill as one that had nothing to do with insurance, but instead was designed to help raise money for the state and balance the state budget. He also argued that the legislature did not follow the constitutional process in passing the bill. The state's constitution requires all revenue-raising measures to either pass the Oklahoma legislature by a three-fourths vote or be submitted to state voters for approval. The attorney for the Oklahoma Health Care Authority argued that the court could use the presumptive argument that all legislation passed by the Oklahoma legislature and signed into law is constitutional. Commissioner Holland's legal challenge now rests with the Court, which must decide whether to uphold the law or strike it down as unconstitutional. Referee Swimley promised that court officials would make a decision about the case "soon." The bill is slated to take effect August 26, 2010, with the first payment of the fee due October 31.
TEXAS: The presidents of the University of Texas system's six health-related universities last week publicly listed their worries about millions of uninsured Texans becoming covered in 2014 under the country's sweeping new health care law: not enough doctors, too little money from government health care programs and fewer commercial insurers to cushion financial losses as they do now. The Chair of the Health Affairs Committee predicted that the changes will impact the UT system "significantly," possibly threatening the health institutions' funding for research and academics. They cited a loss of federal and state money for facilities that care for a large share of low-income and uninsured patients as the key culprit. They also fear that many people who are currently uninsured and who begin buying insurance in 2014 will buy the cheapest insurance they can get. The presidents worry that the result will be fewer commercial insurers, which now absorb some of the costs and help hospitals make up for low payments from Medicaid. But they stopped short of characterizing the law as a negative and called it the "new normal" instead. The six schools plan to find more efficient ways to care for patients, including the use of more nurse practitioners http://www.easytoinsureme.com/. End of update
