Friday, June 03, 2016

Another Obamacare Co-Op Bites the Dust

By Douglas V. Gibbs

As healthcare costs skyrocket, and insurance companies are scrambling as a result of the failure the Affordable Care Act has become (and was from the beginning), Ohio's InHealth Mutual has announced it will be the 13th co-op to close its doors since Obamacare grabbed hold of the nation with a bounty full of false promises.  The catastrophic effect Obamacare has had on the health insurance industry is forcing the private part of the industry out of business. Opponents of the Affordable Care Act will tell you that is all by design.

As the 2017 open enrollment period approaches its latter days, more insurers may be following Ohio's InHealth Mutual out the door.  In the case of InHealth Mutual, the State’s Department of Insurance requested to liquidate the insurer.

As the insurers bail, the rates will continue to rise.  Health Care under the government plan has become unaffordable, and the quality of health care in America, and the availability of care, is tanking - as predicted by those who have stood against Obamacare.  The insurers just can't compete in the market created by Obama and the leftwing, socialist, commie Democrats.  It's killing the free market - and this will all force the hand of Obama's big government goons (as hoped for by the big government statists working with Obama) and they will announce that to save health care, the government will have to take full socialist control.

The economics of Obamacare is also becoming a major disaster.  InHealth Mutual enrolled nearly 22,000 consumers, with the majority selecting individual market plans. Customers now have 60 days to select a new plan on the federal exchange - likely at a grossly increased rate.

Twenty-four co-ops launched in 2013 with a total of $2.4 billion in start up and solvency loans awarded by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.  With Ohio's InHealth Mutual being the lucky number 13th to exit the system, a new crisis is arising.  InHealth Mutual received $129.2 million in loans, according to the agency.  Collectively, the now 13 failed co-ops received more than $1.3 billion in loans and enrolled more than 730,000 consumers across the 14 states they served. Those consumers were forced to pick new plans on the exchanges.  The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has not yet said definitively whether the co-ops will be able to repay the loans received.

Don't worry, your tax dollars will come in handy to bail out yet another failed Democrat Party mess.

Many of the co-ops that closed their doors did so late last year and cited Obamacare’s risk corridor program as their reason for doing so.  Under the risk corridor program, insurers requesting money from it received just 12.6 percent of the total amount they each asked the government for. InHealth Mutual expected to receive $47 million from the risk corridor program, according to court filings.

Additionally, two other smaller insurers not selling coverage on Obamacare’s exchanges—Health Plan Select in Georgia and Family Health Hawaii—announced their respective decisions to close.  Obamacare is an equal opportunity disaster.  Insurers, whether they participate, or not, are going down like enemy aircraft.

Officials with Health Plan Select in Georgia decided to close “rather than pay a surcharge into the federal exchange.”

“Smaller insurers have exited the market entirely or closed down—insurers that weren’t even on the exchanges—because they were hit with huge bills for risk adjustment,” said Ed Haislmaier, a Heritage Foundation senior research fellow in health policy

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary

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