Five ways Trump’s efforts to strip the ACA will affect healthcare
Here’s a quick guide to the meaning behind Trump’s executive order and decision to stop cost-sharing reduction payments.
As President Trump works to dismantle the ACA by way of
- Health insurance could be less expensive for young, healthy individuals and more expensive for those that are older and sicker.
The executive order could potentially ease rules on the sale of “association health plans” and short-term, low-cost insurance policies, which are less-regulated and unlikely to include the same minimum coverage requirements as Obamacare plans.
Day
These new offerings are likely to draw younger, healthier individuals out of the ACA marketplaces, which will cause older, sicker individuals to shoulder more of the cost burden of plans in state insurance exchanges that offer comprehensive coverage with essential benefits, says Rosemarie Day, president of Day Health Strategies
“This will happen primarily in the ACA marketplaces-non-group insurance-but could also impact small businesses,” she says. “What’s more, people enrolled in the association health plans could lose certain consumer protections. For example, the policies could exclude those with pre-existing conditions or base rates on an individual’s health background.”
2. Premiums could rise.
The cost-sharing payments are paid to insurers monthly to help offset the costs associated with the ACA. President Trump authorized the payments through October 2017, but on November 12 announced they are stopping immediately.
“This will harm insurers who were doing business in good faith in the ACA marketplaces-they will have to absorb this loss,” says Day. “This is likely to push more insurers out of the ACA marketplaces; others will have to raise rates, which will hurt individuals who don’t qualify for subsidies.”
Jeffrey Hulburt, CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Care Organization, says the abrupt move to end healthcare subsidies with no transition period is a transparent, risky political maneuver that could have a drastic, irreversible negative impact on the insurance market.
“There’s no transition period or guidance to help states navigate the abrupt loss of millions of dollars in federal support,” Hulburt says. “This sudden, drastic move is a bold political maneuver aimed at forcing Congress to take action.”
3. Bipartisan solutions could lose importance.
“The focus will be off of finding a bipartisan solution to fix the ACA and distract us from other critical issues,” Day says. For example, reauthorizing the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), “which has long enjoyed bipartisan support,” she says.
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