Homestretch 5: Health insurance market reform
[This is the fifth in a series of six articles summarizing the leading categories of issues at stake in the final stages -- the homestretch -- of the debate on national health insurance and health care reform.]
A recent Congressional Report initiated by Senator Jay Rockefeller found that while the insurance industry has long claimed that 87% of premium dollars go to pay for medical care, in fact, the average is 82% for the top six insurers. This five point difference equates to billions of dollars not being spent on hardworking families’ medical care. And these findings underscore the need for meaningful reform of the insurance industry. The three bills in Congress (H.R. 3962, Senate HELP and Senate Finance) include major reform to the private health insurance companies. These reforms will vastly change the way in which companies decide who qualifies for insurance and who does not. In a historic vote this past weekend, the House passed H.R. 3962, including many changes to the health insurance market. Senator majority leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has combined the two Senate proposals and sent a couple of different versions to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) for consideration. He is waiting on the report from the CBO before releasing a final Senate bill, which will be the version sent to the Senate floor for debate. Until the final Senate bill is released we will offer comparison and analysis on the two Senate bills (HELP and Finance).
The three bills provide for significant reform to the health insurance industry, which would greatly expand access to health insurance. As discussed in Homestretch part 4, all three proposals create a health insurance Exchange, which would regulate the individual and small group insurance plans available in the Exchange. Benefit plans in the Exchange would be standardized. Plans would vary on the level of cost-sharing of co-pays and deductibles. Private insurance companies participating in the Exchange could not deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions. Additionally, premiums could not vary because of gender or pre-existing conditions.
The only characteristics that are permitted to factor into premiums are age, tobacco use, family composition and geography. The three proposals set ratios for premium variation based on age and tobacco use. The Senate Finance bill limits age variation to a 4 to 1 ratio and tobacco use to a 1.5 to 1 ratio. For example, a company can only charge its oldest customers four times that of its youngest customers. The Senate HELP bill limits age variation to a 2 to 1 ratio and tobacco use to a 1.5 to 1 ratio. H.R. 3962 limits age variation to a 2 to 1 ratio, but does not allow insurance companies to vary premiums based on tobacco use. The insurance companies indicated they will fight the limiting ratios, because they argue that they will raise costs to younger and healthier individuals.
The Exchange contained in the three bills would also require that insurance companies issue insurance to a consumer regardless of their health status. Additionally, an insurance company could not sell a consumer a plan that explicitly does not cover their pre-existing medical condition. Companies would have to guarantee that they will renew an individual’s policy each year. Additionally, each proposal sets limits for annual out-of-pocket costs to policy holders. Insurance companies would not be able to limit the amount of claims a policy holder makes either annually or in a lifetime. In other words, an insurance company could not suddenly tell a policyholder that they will no longer cover that policyholder’s claims.
Senator Rockefeller faced significant difficulties in getting the insurance companies to voluntarily divulge what portion of the premiums goes to medical care versus profit, administration, etc. This would change under all proposals. Both of the Senate proposals require insurance companies to report how much of the revenue from premiums goes toward paying for medical services. The House proposal requires that the Secretary of Health and Human Services sets a minimum percentage of revenue that must pay for medical services. If the companies do not meet this minimum then they must provide rebates to their customers.
The aforementioned reform is quite similar among the three proposals, but to whom they would apply differs. Senate Finance would apply these changes to the individual and small group market (businesses with fewer than 50 employees). Senate HELP and the House bill would apply reforms to all private insurance markets, including businesses of all sizes. And the Senate Finance bill would, however, require that all new policies, both inside and outside of the Exchange, meet the standards of one of four benefit levels set forth in the proposal.
These reforms will offer greater consumer protections and decrease insurance companies’ discriminatory practices. Some of these measures may face fierce debate an opposition in the coming weeks as the Senate sends a final bill to the floor for debate and final bill is composed for President Obama’s consideration. These reforms will mean containing costs, creating choices, upgrading care and ultimately covering all.
