You can keep your doctor, you can keep your insurance, it will bend the cost curve down, it will … oh never mind. This is what change looks like.
Anthem Blue Cross has been approved, by the state of Connecticut, to raise rates as high as 47% for some policies, and 19% for all policies as it attempts to meet new mandates from …. drum roll please …. Obamacare! From the Hartford Courant.
For all of its individual market plans, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield has received approval to raise rates by at least 19 percent — including a range of 30 percent to 44 percent for the brand of plans in the individual market that was most popular in 2009, Century Preferred.If this were not so serious and so stupid at the same time … it would be laughable.
The reason for the increases is the new federal health reform mandates, according to Anthem and the state Department of Insurance, which is defending its approval against charges by Attorney General Richard Blumenthal. Those reforms took effect Sept. 23.
It is not clear how many people are paying, or will pay, these new rates because federal reform allows insurers to grandfather certain plans that existed before reform was passed in March. What it means for Anthem customers is that anyone who enrolled before March 24 will have the option of staying in their current plan, which would increase next year based on rising costs but not because the plan will have added benefits mandated by federal law. Anyone who bought an Anthem plan on March 24 or later will pay the new rates.Richard Blumenthal of course is “deeply disappointed” and has condemned the state insurance commissioner for not looking specifically at insurance costs and profits as required by law. But Commissioner Thomas Sullivan has fired back.
“The rates that were filed and approved reflect the current cost to deliver care and the impact of more comprehensive benefit designs required under the federal healthcare reform law. If the attorney general wants to complain to someone, he should be complaining to Congress.”Read the entire post by Courant reporter Matthew Sturdevant. It’s classic.
Ironically even Obama now seems to understand these kind of rate increases will become the norm. Not even Richard “jobs” Blumenthal could expect insurance companies to keep rates the same when the Obama is demanding that they accept any child after they get sick, or allow 26 year old “children” to stay on parents’ policies. This is gunna get worse folks, made even more outrageous by the fact that they pushed this crap down our throats.
Jon! you know as well as I that the insurance companies are covering their ass. They have no evidence what the new provisions will cost, they are just recooping for some other stuff they haven't been able to justify since there was nothing left to blame it on. The already sick kids and 26 year olds won't even amount to 5% of the market. That doesn't translate into a 30-40% raise. There is a lot more to this that they are covering up other than what is mandateed by the Healthcare bill.
ReplyDeleteSorry, Austin, but you are never going to convince me that the "evil" insurance companies are all at fault for the rise in medical costs. The CAUSE (in capital letters) is involvement by the GOVERNMENT (again in capital letters). If you ever took an Economics 101 course you should understand the law of supply and demand. Let's take two companies that sell basically the same widget(health insurance policies) in a free market. How do they go about getting a good share of the market? They lower the cost as far as possible and make them the best quality. Get the Federal and State governments out of healthcare ENTIRELY(Capital letters again, let the FREE insurance market compete, and watch healthcare costs drop and quality go up. It works every time it's tried. GOVERNMENT INVOLVEMENT NEVER MAKES ANYTHING CHEAPER and MORE EFFICIENT. I'd love for you to give me an example where it has.
ReplyDeletePlease, please stop buying into the "demonizing" of Corporate America by the Liberals in Washington. They only want power and your money to redistribute. They don't give a damn about you. All this talk about their compassion is total BS. Please, let's get back to the America we grew up in, otherwise, go vote for Alvin Green and I'm sure he'll vote to give you everything you want. As for me, I don't need the government's help and I don't want it. I want them to leave me the hell alone!!