- Health Care Costs Remain High Despite Obamacare Coverage Gains Bloomberg News by Katherine Greifeld—Uninsured rates in low-income families have fallen under the Affordable Care Act, yet more than a third of Americans continued to face difficulties paying their medical bills in 2016, a survey found. Adults in poor families were among the greatest beneficiaries of the ACA, with uninsured rates falling as much as 17 percentage points since it became law in 2010, according to a study from the Commonwealth Fund, a private, New York-based research organization. Still, 34 percent of Americans said it's difficult or impossible to find affordable health coverage. How the Affordable Care Act Has Improved Americans' Ability to Buy Health Insurance on Their Own
- Risk to Women's Health Benefits Seen in Health Law Repeal AP by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar & Kelli Kennedy—From a return to higher premiums for women to gaps in coverage for birth control and breast pumps, the Republican push to repeal the Obama-era health care law already is raising concerns that women could be hit hard. The 2010 law ended a common industry practice of charging women more than men for policies purchased directly from an insurer. It made maternity and newborn care a required benefit for individual market health plans. And it set a list of preventive services to be provided at no extra cost to women, including birth control and breast pumps used by nursing mothers.
- Prevention Benefits at Risk with an Obamacare Repeal Modern Healthcare by Harris Meyer—The Affordable Care Act extended 100 percent coverage for a range of preventive healthcare services, including some types of cancer screening, to seniors on Medicare. That first-dollar coverage likely saved lives by increasing diagnoses of early-stage colorectal cancer by 8 percent among Medicare beneficiaries during the first three years it was in effect, a new study in Health Affairs reported.
- Health Insurers Warn of Wider Defections from ACA Marketplaces for 2018 Washington Post by Amy Goldstein—Leaders for the health insurance industry, state insurance commissioners and brokers warned Wednesday that more health plans almost certainly will defect from Affordable Care Act marketplaces unless Congress and the Trump administration provide some concrete assurances within the next two months. Unless the government promises to continue subsidies and other features of the law for at least another year, some states probably will not have any insurers selling health plans to individuals buying coverage on their own for 2018, the witnesses warned at a Senate hearing.