Aetna pulling out of the ACA exchanges - Effect on Affordable Care Act

[Playball40]

So with the announcement that Aetna is pulling out of 70% of the exchanges after United and Humana did previously, what does this mean for affordable healthcare? Did Aetna do this as retaliation for the DOJ injunction to stop the Aetna/Humana merger? Or is this 'really' about costs? What is next in store for ACA now? Please don't tell me how bad/good you think Obamacare is/was - I really just want to know what you think is going to happen in the short and long runs?

http://www.businessinsider.com/aetna-ditching-70-of-obamacare-business-2016-8

 

[dismal]

They are all losing money selling at current prices. So prices gonna go up.

If the regulators don't let prices go up enough, more sellers will exit.

The question now is whether there is a stable point where prices are high enough insurers are willing to sell and enough healthy people are still willing to buy.

 

[Trausti]

The ACA is in a death spiral. Makes sense for a lot of people, at least those who don't get government subsidies, to forego buying expensive private insurance and instead put that money in a savings account. If you have to pay high premiums and deductibles before insurance kicks in, what's the point of the insurance?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

They are all losing money selling at current prices. So prices gonna go up.

If the regulators don't let prices go up enough, more sellers will exit.

The question now is whether there is a stable point where prices are high enough insurers are willing to sell and enough healthy people are still willing to buy.

There aren't enough "healthy" people to support the system, and that is precisely what the article states.

It looks bad for the ACA unless we want to have less aircraft carriers, you know, guns or butter and all that...

For those few "healthy" people, a catastrophic policy was still the best deal out there, but those are no longer allowed.

 

[Medicine Man]

So with the announcement that Aetna is pulling out of 70% of the exchanges after United and Humana did previously, what does this mean for affordable healthcare?

That some insurers are pretty-obviously doing a much-better-JOB, than others.​

April 19, 2016 - "UnitedHealth Group, the nation’s largest health insurer, announced Tuesday that it would stop selling health plans through the Affordable Care Act next year in most of the 34 of states where it operates.

The move, widely expected for months, will likely have relatively little effect on what most consumers pay for health coverage, as other insurers have out-competed UnitedHealth in the marketplaces created by the 2010 health law."

http://www.latimes.c...0419-story.html​

​

 

[dismal]

They are all losing money selling at current prices. So prices gonna go up.

If the regulators don't let prices go up enough, more sellers will exit.

The question now is whether there is a stable point where prices are high enough insurers are willing to sell and enough healthy people are still willing to buy.

There aren't enough "healthy" people to support the system, and that is precisely what the article states.

It looks bad for the ACA unless we want to have less aircraft carriers, you know, guns or butter and all that...

For those few "healthy" people, a catastrophic policy was still the best deal out there, but those are no longer allowed.

They have a catastrophic policy. It's called Obamacare guaranteed issue. No point in buying insurance while you're healthy if you can wait to buy it when you're sick.

 

[untermensche]

They are not losing money.

They are merely not making what they want to make.

They want guarantees.

We should do away with them. They are inefficient and greedy.

Universal Medicare for all.

It's time for the US to join the late 20th Century.

 

[dismal]

They are not losing money.

Enjoy your separate version of reality. In the other the rest of us inhabit insurers and co-ops are exiting markets because they are losing money.

 

[untermensche]

They are not losing money.

Enjoy your separate version of reality. In the other the rest of us inhabit insurers and co-ops are exiting markets because they are losing money.

They are using financial manipulation to CLAIM they are losing money.

I don't believe them or you.

What are they paying their top executives? What are they paying investors?

The answer to the health insurance problem remains Medicare for all despite the continual corporate malfeasance.

It is the best solution, and not the legislation aimed to mostly help insurance corporations, Obamacare.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Why did anybody believe that Obamacare would work? You need a single payer system that is funded through tax dollars and not optional, and without any profit motivated insurance companies involved... how is this not obvious?

 

[untermensche]

Why did anybody believe that Obamacare would work? You need a single payer system that is funded through tax dollars and not optional, and without any profit motivated insurance companies involved... how is this not obvious?

It was supposed to include a public option, which would help keep insurance corporations from lying and provide a non-profit alternative, something a lot of people want.

People are tired of for-profit health insurance.

It is less and less for more and more every year.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Forget a public "option". That still keeps the insurance companies with their hands grabbing for the money. Health care should not be profit driven. It SHOULD be a net loss. How anybody expects a health care system that works and also makes a profit.... boggles the mind. It should be losing money and it should not be at all attractive for private interests to get involved.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Why did anybody believe that Obamacare would work? You need a single payer system that is funded through tax dollars and not optional, and without any profit motivated insurance companies involved... how is this not obvious?

Ya, it's a dumb system but it's the only one that was politically viable at the time. Maybe President Clinton can fix it.

If the for-profit insurance companies want to exit the industry, the answer to that should be "Fine. Have a nice day. I apologize for not having mandated your removal decades ago. That was my bad". Let the states set up their own not-for-profit insurance agencies financed through tax dollars and cut the irrelevant middlemen out entirely. The goals of making money and providing health coverage are not always compatible goals, so they shouldn't be linked together.

 

[Trausti]

Forget a public "option". That still keeps the insurance companies with their hands grabbing for the money. Health care should not be profit driven. It SHOULD be a net loss. How anybody expects a health care system that works and also makes a profit.... boggles the mind. It should be losing money and it should not be at all attractive for private interests to get involved.

But people will still want the private option as DMV-like health insurance is hardly assuring.

The number of private health care insurance policies has increased in recent years. In 2011 about 440,000 people had private health care insurance. Most of these people have their policy paid by their employer.
Private health care insurance complements public welfare and social protection systems. Health care insurance gives faster care and can also help towards covering some costs that arise in connection with health care.

http://www.svenskforsakring.se/PageFiles/6717/SF_Statistikbroschyr_2012_ENG_web.pdf?epslanguage=sv

"It's quicker to get a colleague back to work if you have an operation in two weeks' time rather than having to wait for a year," privately insured Anna Norlander told Sveriges Radio on Friday. "It's terrible that I, as a young person, don't feel I can trust the health care system to take care of me."

The insurance plan guarantees that she can see a specialist within four working days, and get a time for surgery, if needed, within 15.

http://www.thelocal.se/20140117/hospital-queues-tied-to-insurance-trend

Canada has one of the lowest rates of MRI scanning machines per capita in the developed world, with six MRI scanners per million people, compared to 40.1 in Japan, 14.4 in Switzerland and 26.6 in the United States. Pittsburgh alone has more MRI machines than all of Canada.

http://www.bcliving.ca/health/mri-scans-waiting-for-public-health-care-vs-paying-for-a-private-mri-clinic

 

[Nice Squirrel]

But people will still want the private option as DMV-like health insurance is hardly assuring.

Canada has one of the lowest rates of MRI scanning machines per capita in the developed world, with six MRI scanners per million people, compared to 40.1 in Japan, 14.4 in Switzerland and 26.6 in the United States. Pittsburgh alone has more MRI machines than all of Canada.

http://www.bcliving.ca/health/mri-scans-waiting-for-public-health-care-vs-paying-for-a-private-mri-clinic

In my private plan I still have to wait to see a doctor. Months for a specialist. I have no real choice in companies since work subsidizes it and they are using a different metric I would use to purchase insurance. As far as the MRI issue, that was addressed long time ago, and the article was misleading to begin with. Number of MRI machines does not mean better care, just like owning four cars does not make me four times the better driver.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Forget a public "option". That still keeps the insurance companies with their hands grabbing for the money. Health care should not be profit driven. It SHOULD be a net loss. How anybody expects a health care system that works and also makes a profit.... boggles the mind. It should be losing money and it should not be at all attractive for private interests to get involved.

Because we don't know what we would miss without it being there. It's always easy to saw let's make people equal. Were the people in the middle ages better off heallth care wise because they all had the same amount of health care?

 

[Tom Sawyer]

But people will still want the private option as DMV-like health insurance is hardly assuring.

And there's nothing wrong with that. If you want to have a two-tier health care system where the rich both pay into the common system and also pay extra for their own private coverage, that's fine. The point is that providing quality health coverage for all of your citizens should be one of the fundamental characteristics of a modern society. What you do beyond that is less relevant. It's not a cost which should be borne by businesses and not a cost which should be borne by individuals.

 

[Trausti]

But people will still want the private option as DMV-like health insurance is hardly assuring.



http://www.bcliving.ca/health/mri-scans-waiting-for-public-health-care-vs-paying-for-a-private-mri-clinic

In my private plan I still have to wait to see a doctor. Months for a specialist. I have no real choice in companies since work subsidizes it and they are using a different metric I would use to purchase insurance. As far as the MRI issue, that was addressed long time ago, and the article was misleading to begin with. Number of MRI machines does not mean better care, just like owning four cars does not make me four times the better driver.

Shouldn't you have a right to purchase the private insurance you want? Some plans only cover in-group care (like a health system or co-op) while others let you shop around. I think the government should not interfere in what you think is best for you.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Forget a public "option". That still keeps the insurance companies with their hands grabbing for the money. Health care should not be profit driven. It SHOULD be a net loss. How anybody expects a health care system that works and also makes a profit.... boggles the mind. It should be losing money and it should not be at all attractive for private interests to get involved.

Because we don't know what we would miss without it being there. It's always easy to saw let's make people equal. Were the people in the middle ages better off heallth care wise because they all had the same amount of health care?

Holy irrelevant garbage, batman.

This isn't an issue one needs to have abstract, theoretical arguments about. There are many examples of government run health care systems which can be used as models without getting into a navel gazing "let's make people equal" kind of argument.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Because we don't know what we would miss without it being there. It's always easy to saw let's make people equal. Were the people in the middle ages better off heallth care wise because they all had the same amount of health care?

Holy irrelevant garbage, batman.

This isn't an issue one needs to have abstract, theoretical arguments about. There are many examples of government run health care systems which can be used as models without getting into a navel gazing "let's make people equal" kind of argument.

Nope. The systems are very much intertwined. Canada very much rides on the performance of the US health care system.