Letter: Cheers to Supreme Court, boos to Rauner's real agenda - Quad-Cities Online: Letters

Posted: Saturday, July 4, 2015 11:00 pm

Letter: Cheers to Supreme Court, boos to Rauner's real agenda

If you were to listen to the rantings of some people, you would think that the Supreme Court overthrew the government of the United States. One letter writer went so far as to say that it was our country's darkest hour.

Really, get a grip. If our county's darkest hour was a week that gave every single person in the Ccountry access to health care and anyone the right to marry, then this is one fantastic country. No lives are lost, no one is hurt, and in fact lives will probably be saved due to everyone now having access to health care and all those on the right can do is complain.

 

Also it is getting tiring listening to those on the right try to paint Gov. Bruce Rauner as being the adult in the room during the ongoing budget negotiations.

The governor's budget was further out of whack than the one he was presented with. The issues that he is holding firm on have nothing to do with the budget process but are only intended to gut collective bargaining.

To all of you slow learners out there, these issues pertaining to collective bargaining and prevailing wage are subject to legislation, not the budget process.

The truth is plain and simple, the governor has no social conscience and is willing to inflict collateral damage on the states most vulnerable in order to serve the interests of his wealthy friends and destroy collective bargaining in the State of Illinois.

Gregg Johnson,

East Moline

Letter: Cheers to Supreme Court, boos to Rauner's real agenda - Quad-Cities Online: Letters

U.S. Supreme Court rejects Obamacare 'death panel' challenge - Yahoo News

 

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a new challenge to President Barack Obama's healthcare law that took aim at a bureaucratic board labeled by some Republicans as a "death panel" because it was designed to cut Medicare costs.

The high court left intact a ruling by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that threw out the lawsuit.

The court’s action in an unsigned order was a victory for Obama administration, which has faced a barrage of legal challenges to the 2010 Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare. The court is currently weighing a separate case challenging health insurance subsidies that are key to Obamacare’s implementation. A ruling is due by the end of June.

In the case that the justices rejected on Monday, Arizona-based business owner Nick Coons and Dr. Eric Novack, an orthopedic surgeon, sued in 2011 in litigation backed by a conservative legal group.

Among other things, they challenged the Independent Payment Advisory Board, or IPAB, a 15-member government panel dubbed by some Republicans as a "death panel" because of its intended role in trimming costs within Medicare, the government healthcare program for the elderly and disabled.

Lower courts threw out the lawsuit. In its August 2014 ruling, the appeals court said that the plaintiffs had not shown they had suffered any harm that they could sue over.

On the IPAB claim, the court noted that under the terms of the healthcare law, the board acts only if Medicare spending increases at a certain level. The earliest it could ever take any action that could potentially reduce Novack’s Medicare reimbursements would be in 2019.

The plaintiffs, represented by the Phoenix, Arizona-based conservative Goldwater Institute, also challenged a provision of the law, known as the individual mandate, that requires Americans to obtain health insurance. Those claims were also rejected.

The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate in 2012.

The case on which the court acted on is Coons v. Lew, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 14-525

U.S. Supreme Court rejects Obamacare 'death panel' challenge - Yahoo News

Governor Rauner Seeks to Cut Medicaid by $1.5 Billion :: Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog

 

…..But the governor’s cuts go far beyond that to broader and traditional medical providers. While eligibility requirements will not change, and copays or premiums will not increase for individual patients, certain providers will pick up the slack. Hospitals will lose 13% of its budget down to $735 million and could lead to the loss of thousands of jobs at those hospitals, based on at least one estimate. As far as nursing homes, about $216 million would be removed from the Medicaid budget for expenses at those facilities. There would be an additional $40 million cut from pharmaceutical-related expenditures.
State's Budget Woes

The state budget cuts here are an attempt to make up for Illinois’s immense $6.2 billion deficit. Yet while the state may save and work toward balancing its budget, it remains to be seen whether medical providers – largely hospitals and nursing home in this situation – will truly take a cut, or simply pass the cost on to private insurance, which could potentially result in eventual premium and/or copay amounts.

This also comes on the heels of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which among its many provisions included an expansion of Medicaid that would be funded by the federal government, but which states could also choose to opt out. While reports indicate Governor Rauner considered this option, it appears that for the moment it won’t and that Illinois will accept that money. The proposed budget also apparently presumes that many Illinois residents will take advantage of the health care exchange subsidized by the ACA, which will save the state money as well.

Read the entire article by clicking on the following:  Governor Rauner Seeks to Cut Medicaid by $1.5 Billion :: Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog

White House extends Obamacare deadline, admits subsidy snafu - Yahoo Finance

 

Bowing to pressure, the Obama administration is extending Obamacare enrollment for those who learn they owe a penalty for being uninsured in 2014.

Officials also acknowledged that some 800,000 Obamacare enrollees received incorrect subsidy information on the 1095-A tax forms sent by the federal exchange, healthcare.gov. Some enrollees were mistakenly told they received too large a subsidy, while others were told their subsidy was too small.

The special enrollment period, which runs from March 15 to April 30, is open to those who remain uninsured now and who learned they owe the penalty after open enrollment ended on Feb. 15. It applies to those in the 37 states using the federal exchange, though Washington, Minnesota and Vermont have already extended enrollment for penalty payers. Other states, including California, are considering similar moves.

Some 44% likely to be penalized for not having coverage had heard nothing or only a little about the fee, according to a new survey from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Urban Institute.

Many of the uninsured are learning they owe the penalty for 2014 when they file their taxes. This is prompting some to want to enroll for this year, when the penalty is even larger. But since enrollment closed on Sunday, they were out of luck.

White House extends Obamacare deadline, admits subsidy snafu - Yahoo Finance

Illinois health law enrollment climbs past quarter-million - The Clinton Herald, Clinton, Iowa: News

 

CHICAGO (AP) — Nearly 287,000 Illinois residents have signed up for private coverage under President Barack Obama's health care law. The enrollment surpasses last year numbers, when about 217,000 Illinoisans signed up.

The Health and Human Services Department updated the Illinois tally Wednesday. The figure includes consumers who were automatically re-enrolled into their current plan or a plan with similar benefits.

There's one month to go in the enrollment period. The Obama administration expects a surge of sign-ups near the Feb. 15 deadline.

Illinois is one of 37 states served by the HealthCare.gov website where consumers can shop for insurance and qualify for financial help. Ten health insurance companies are participating in Illinois.

The law offers subsidized private coverage to people who don't have health insurance on the job.

Illinois health law enrollment climbs past quarter-million - The Clinton Herald, Clinton, Iowa: News

Little Evidence That The ACA Affected Part-Time Employment

Bowen Garrett and Robert Kaestner

new evidence on the question using the latest available data
from the Current Population Survey (CPS).
We find no evidence that the ACA had already started increasing part-time work before 2014. We find a small
increase in part-time work in 2014 beyond what would be expected at this point in the economic recovery based
on prior experience since 2000. This increase in part-time work is fully attributable to an increase in involuntary
part-time work. The increase in involuntary part-time work, however, is not specific to the category of part-time work
defined by the ACA (i.e., less than 30 hours per week), but applies to part-time work more broadly (also between 30 and
34 hours per week). Moreover, transitions between full-time and part-time work in 2014 are in line with historic patterns.
These findings suggest that the increase in part-time work in 2014 is not ACA related, but more likely due to a slower than
normal recovery of full-time jobs following the Great Recession.

Read the entire 17 page report by clicking on the following:  http://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/reports/2014/rwjf415284

Another GOP Holdout State Expands Medicaid Under Obamacare

 

The Obama administration announced this afternoon that Pennsylvania will expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, bringing another half million Americans health care coverage under the law.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett, a Republican in a tough race to be re-elected, reached a compromise with the Obama administration to allow the state to expand Medicaid through managed-care organizations. The deal should be a boost to private health insurance companies in the Medicaid business like Aetna AET +1% (AET), UnitedHealth Group UNH -0.05% (UNH), Humana HUM +0.25% (HUM), Molina (MOH) and Centene (CNC).

Read more by clicking on the following:  http://www.forbes.com/sites/brucejapsen/2014/08/28/another-gop-holdout-state-expands-medicaid-under-obamacare/

Gaining Ground: Americans' Health Insurance Coverage and Access to Care After the Affordable Care Act's First Open Enrollment Period

 

The Commonwealth Fund is a private foundation that aims to promote a high performing health care system that achieves better access, improved quality, and greater efficiency, particularly for society's most vulnerable, including low-income people, the uninsured, minority Americans, young children, and elderly adults.

The Fund carries out this mandate by supporting independent research on health care issues and making grants to improve health care practice and policy. An international program in health policy is designed to stimulate innovative policies and practices in the United States and other industrialized countries,

Read the entire article by clicking on the following:  http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2014/jul/health-coverage-access-aca