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Politics : The Obama - Clinton Disaster -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GROUND ZERO™ who wrote (90671)	1/24/2014 1:23:53 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Respond to of 103300

Law Restricting Obamacare Navigators Blocked by Missouri Judge By Alex Nussbaum and Andrew Zajac Jan 24, 2014 9:16 AM ET bloomberg.com ...U.S. District Judge Ortrie Smith in Jefferson City, Missouri, said the state, which declined to establish its own exchange, was barred from interfering with a program set up under the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Missouri is among at least a dozen Republican-led states that imposed restrictions on insurance exchange counselors, known as navigators, including licensing tests, fines as high as $1,000 and training that almost doubles the hours required by the government. The ruling was the first of its kind in a navigator case and calls into question the constitutionality of similar laws elsewhere, said Jay Angoff, an attorney with Washington-based Mehri & Skalet PLLC, which represented the Missouri groups. “Missouri’s attempts to obstruct the Affordable Care Act with unnecessary and burdensome navigator requirements are simply preempted by federal law,” wrote Jane Perkins, an attorney for nonprofit groups that sued the state, in a statement. “On this the court is clear: federally funded navigators must be able to exercise the duties they are funded to do under federal law.” ...“Having made the choice to leave the operation of the exchange to the federal government, Missouri cannot choose to impose additional requirements or limitations on the exchange,” Smith wrote yesterday in granting a preliminary injunction suspending enforcement of the law by the Missouri Department of Insurance, Financial Institutions and Professional Registration....

To: GROUND ZERO™ who wrote (90671)	1/24/2014 1:26:16 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 103300

Obamacare Private Plan Enrollment Reaches 3 Million By Alex Wayne Jan 24, 2014 12:43 PM ET bloomberg.com About 800,000 people signed up for private health plans through Obamacare in January, pushing total enrollment to 3 million as negative perceptions about the program give way to more practical needs. Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, touted the January figures in a speech today in Jacksonville, Florida, which add to the 2.2 million who enrolled from Oct. 1 through December. Her agency later said in a blog post that “as our outreach efforts kick into even higher gear, we anticipate these numbers will continue to grow.” The acceleration may indicate increased familiarity and interest in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act among people who previously had heard only of its problems, said Ron Pollack, executive director of the advocacy group Families USA. Public opinion about Obamacare plunged after the Oct. 1 debut of the insurance exchanges greeted consumers with website breakdowns, higher prices and potentially broken promises. “People were bombarded about the politics and learned precious little about how it would affect their lives,” Pollack, whose Washington-based organization has been promoting the health law, said in a telephone interview. “You’re seeing a significant acceleration that is just going to be larger and larger as we move toward the end of March.” Insurers Benefit Higher enrollment should benefit WellPoint Inc. (WLP), Humana Inc. (HUM) and other managed-care insurers that rely on a large and diverse patient-mix to balance out the costs of coverage. If the pace of sign-ups continues, enrollment should be close to 5 million by the end of March, said Ana Gupte, an analyst at Leerink Partners in New York. “This is positive for HMO stocks that have made a bet in favor of the exchanges,” she said in an e-mail. WellPoint fell 1.2 percent to $84.74 in at 12:27 p.m. in New York amid a broader selloff of stocks worldwide. Health Net Inc. dropped 3.5 percent to $33.54, while Humana lost less than 1 percent to $95.53. The Affordable Care Act, which mainly took full effect Jan. 1, marks the largest U.S. expansion of health insurance in more than 40 years. The law set up government-run insurance exchanges where Americans can buy private health plans with the help of federal tax credits. It also expanded eligibility in some state-run Medicaid programs for the poor. Meeting Targets The Obama administration had a goal of signing up about 7 million people in private plans by the end of March, based on estimates from the Congressional Budget Office. The law’s first enrollment period ends March 31. “We continue to see strong interest nationwide from consumers who want access to quality, affordable coverage,” Marilyn Tavenner, the administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said in a blog post. A Gallup poll released yesterday showed that the percentage of adults without health insurance in the U.S. fell to 16.1 percent this month, the lowest level since the end of 2012. The 3 million sign-ups reflect people who selected a plan using federal and state enrollment systems. People must pay their first month’s premium to complete their enrollment, and it’s unclear what fraction of enrollees haven’t yet paid. Word-of-Mouth Pollack said the enrollment acceleration is driven mainly by word-of-mouth, as people hear stories of friends or neighbors who have found exchange plans they feel are affordable. People earning less than four times the poverty level, or about $94,000 for a family of four, are eligible for tax credits that reduce the monthly premium for exchange plans. About 79 percent of people who had enrolled through December benefited from subsidies, according to a report from Sebelius’s department. Sebelius’s speech in Jacksonville was part of a travel schedule that frequently takes her to large states with many uninsured people whose Republican governors refused to build their own insurance exchanges. She has made multiple appearances in both Florida and Texas over the past six months, two of the 36 states covered by the federal insurance exchange. To contact the reporter on this story: Alex Wayne in Washington at awayne3@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Reg Gale at rgale5@bloomberg.net