First wave of Obamacare destroys single practice doctors

[Valin]

Obamacare Can’t Handle the Truth: Data Not Adding Up for Enrollees
Marguerite Bowling
June 08, 2014

 

Obamacare prompts one huge headache right off the bat for Sylvia Mathews Burwell, the newly confirmed secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

 

Vast discrepancies in data on Obamacare enrollees could put at least 2 million newly insured Americans at risk, according to a government report provided to Associated Press.

 

Officials found data from application forms not matching what was in federal records, which could affect how much consumers pay for their health plans or if they are even legally eligible for benefits, AP reported. It suggested the final number of enrollees affected could be higher.

 

President Obama’s signature legislative achievement, formally known as the Affordable Care Act, gave taxpayer-funded subsidies to eligible Americans for buying health insurance plans on federal and state-run online exchanges.

 

(Snip)

[clearvision]

What a mess.

[Draggingtree]

Virginia GOP Pulls a Fast One

 

Posted on | June 9, 2014 | 10 Comments

 

A Democrat member of the Virginia state Senate has announced he will resign, a move that will likely prevent newly elected Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffe from imposing ObamaCare on the state — and this appears to have been arranged by Virginia Republicans in a thoroughly Machiavellian maneuver that will give GOP control of the state Senate.

http://theothermccain.com/2014/06/09/virginia-gop-pulls-a-fast-one/

[pollyannaish]

My god. It's even worse than I expected.

[Valin]

My god. It's even worse than I expected.

 

[Valin]

Liberals Warm Up to ACA Mandate Repeal
6/11/14

Have we reached a turning point? 55 percent of U.S. voters now wish the Affordable Care Act had never passed and the 2009 system was back, according to a new Fox News poll. That’s a fairly surprising shift: Previous polls showed widespread dissent over the new law but no desire to go back to what we had before it.

 

In the face of intensifying opposition to the law, it’s no wonder that supporters are becoming increasingly vocal about changing it. There’s been bipartisan support for scrapping the ACA’s employer mandate for some time now, but WaPo reports that support for a repeal of the mandate is rising on the left:

 

(Snip)

 

Perhaps the law’s supporters shouldn’t be so quick to call for a repeal, however. Though severing the link between insurance and employment makes good sense in an age when people change jobs frequently and quickly, repealing the mandate would likely cause considerable disruptions in the short term. It could also raise the cost of the law for the taxpayer if the people who are kicked off employer-provided plans wind up getting subsidized insurance in the ACA exchanges. So doing away with the mandate could actually increase the public’s opposition to the law, not decrease it. Either way, the calls for repealing the mandate show that we still don’t know what kind of Obamacare we will end up with. The law is already markedly different from its original incarnation; in the next few years it could change even more.

[Valin]

A health care stumble that could wreck the Obamacare facade

Scott Gottlieb

June 11, 2014

 

The inclusion of not-for profit "cooperatives" in President Obama's signature health law was supposed to offer progressive policymakers a lesser alternative to a so-called public option. The co-ops were a concession to those who wanted the ACA to include a government-run health plan. They were a nod to the liberal desire for a federal health plan that would have been offered directly by agencies in Washington.

 

The co-ops were fashioned as an egalitarian alternative to the private, for-profit health plans being offered in the Obamacare exchanges. Funded with taxpayer money, the co-op plans were a deliberate test of whether a not-for-profit approach could triumph over the for-profit plans being offered by traditional insurers.

 

But the co-op program got off to a rocky start, with many of the plans struggling in 2014 to keep prices low, form provider networks, enroll members, and stay afloat.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

Obamacare: What About the Working Class and the Middle Class?

June 18 2014

 

The administration issued a report yesterday that says individuals who selected plans in the federal health insurance exchanges have a post-credit premium that is on average 76% less than the full premium for the plans they selected. And, 69% are paying less than $100 after the subsidies46% are paying $50 or less.

 

The administration also pointed out that 65% of individuals selecting the Silver Plan in the federal exchange chose the lowest or second-lowest cost Silver Plan.

 

As I have said before, only about one-in-three subsidy eligible people bought and paid for coverage during Obamacare's first open-enrollment.

 

It would appear from this data that it is the lowest income people who are most often signing up for coverage. They are the ones who get the biggest premium subsidies as well as the reductions in their deductibles and co-pays.

 

The Obama administration has been touting the report. The new HHS secretary said, "We're finding that the marketplace is working. Consumers have more choices, and they are paying less for their premiums. Nearly 7 in 10 consumers who signed up in the marketplace are paying $100 or less for that coverage."

 

That is one way to look at it.

 

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

HHS Ignores Rule of Law to Transfer Billions of Dollars to Insurers Through PPACA Risk Corridor Program
June 19, 2014

WASHINGTON, DC – The Department of Health and Human Services this week responded to a recent letter from House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) and Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Jeff Sessions (R-AL) regarding the department’s legal authority to issue payments under the president’s health care law’s risk corridor program. Now, HHS argues that the risk corridor program would be considered a user fee in order to justify its authority to make payments under the program, but risk corridors were not listed as a user fee in President Obama’s own FY 2015 budget, released just a few months ago.

 

“Chalk up another executive fiat for this imperial presidency,” commented Upton. “This reversal underscores the administration’s disregard toward the law and Congress, and reveals its ‘whatever it takes’ and ‘whatever it costs’ effort to prop up this broken law.”

 

Sessions commented, “HHS now says that its entire legal authority to make risk corridor payments is predicated on the funds being treated as ‘user fees.’ But as recently as last year, the president’s budget deposited risk corridor payments into the Treasury general fund—conclusive proof that they are not user fees. HHS’ letter serves to confirm our suspicions.”

 

(Snip)

 

 

H/T Hot Air

[clearvision]

HHS Ignores Rule of Law to Transfer Billions of Dollars to Insurers Through PPACA Risk Corridor Program

June 19, 2014

 

WASHINGTON, DC – The Department of Health and Human Services this week responded to a recent letter from House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) and Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Jeff Sessions (R-AL) regarding the department’s legal authority to issue payments under the president’s health care law’s risk corridor program. Now, HHS argues that the risk corridor program would be considered a user fee in order to justify its authority to make payments under the program, but risk corridors were not listed as a user fee in President Obama’s own FY 2015 budget, released just a few months ago.

 

“Chalk up another executive fiat for this imperial presidency,” commented Upton. “This reversal underscores the administration’s disregard toward the law and Congress, and reveals its ‘whatever it takes’ and ‘whatever it costs’ effort to prop up this broken law.”

 

Sessions commented, “HHS now says that its entire legal authority to make risk corridor payments is predicated on the funds being treated as ‘user fees.’ But as recently as last year, the president’s budget deposited risk corridor payments into the Treasury general fund—conclusive proof that they are not user fees. HHS’ letter serves to confirm our suspicions.”

 

(Snip)

 

 

H/T Hot Air

So. What do laws have to do with the US Government?

[Valin]

 

So. What do laws have to do with the US Government?

 

 

Of late......less and less.

[Valin]

The ACA’s Questionable Success in Insuring the Uninsured
6/20/14

Six out of ten Americans insured through the Affordable Care Act were previously uninsured, according to a new Kaiser Family Foundation survey. Previous investigations of the ACA had found much lower proportions of the previously uninsured in the new ACA exchanges. This suggested the law wasn’t achieving even its own goal of expanding coverage. So at first glance, this new survey is great news for supporters of the law looking for evidence Obamacare is making a dent in the number of uninsured.

 

But once you dig deeper into the data, things get complicated. NYT:

 

(Snip)

 

In other words, nearly half of those who said they were previously uninsured actually had insurance sometime in the last five years. Whether it’s fair to call these people “previously uninsured” is a hard question, and in fact there are many outstanding questions about what our uninsured population is really like. Perhaps some of these people were between jobs and would soon have gotten insured again. Perhaps they had insurance but could not afford their premiums (a problem unlikely to go away in the ACA). Whatever the reason why they had and then lost insurance within the last five years, this kind of churn complicates the narrative about the ACA’s march to universal coverage.

 

(Snip)

[Geee]

Obamacare Exchanges Are ‘Disappointing’ With Fewer Than 4 Million Newly Insured. The Government Hoped for 26 Million.

In April, President Obama told the nation that “marketplace” or “exchange” enrollment, at 8 million customers as of March 31, had exceeded expectations and costs were lower than expected.

Many in the news media accepted the selectively released statistics, despite the Obama administration’s record of sometimes providing inaccurate or incomplete information on HealthCare.gov. Even today, the government continues to withhold relevant public information on costs and enrollment requested by Congress and the press under the Freedom of Information Act.

Why did the media accept inaccurate or incomplete information on Obamacare enrollment?

In fact, the measure of the Affordable Care Act’s success rests neither with individual anecdotes nor in the Obama administration’s self-assessments. It’s a long-term process that many analysts say will take years to unfold.

One thing that’s not in question: The insurance industry already has been largely transformed.

 

http://dailysignal.com/2014/06/24/obamacare-exchanges-disappointing/

[Geee]

PA Family Doctor Faces Huge Obamacare Fines, Despite Attempts to Comply

 

Pennsylvania family physician Dr. Francis Brescia, Jr. has found himself facing thousands of dollars of fines under Obamacare because of a mandate regarding how he keeps his medical records, even after he made every effort to comply with the law.

 

Obamacare requires all doctors to keep electronic medical records. For every year a physician fails to keep their records electronically, they are fined. Outside companies typically charge doctors around $50,000 to provide this electronic filing service.

http://freebeacon.com/issues/pa-family-doctor-faces-huge-obamacare-fines-despite-attempts-to-comply/

[Valin]

@Geee

 

Should my head hurt?

[Valin]

Employees Behind Cover Oregon’s Failed Website to Be Rewarded with Bonuses
Molly Wharton
June 26, 2014

 

Workers at Cover Oregon will receive bonuses if they stay on the job during the state’s transition from its own failed Obamacare website to one run by the federal government.

 

Cover Oregon interim CEO Clyde Hamstreet said in a letter that since April, 27 employees have left the state’s disastrous attempt at building their own health-care exchange, which has been the subject of severe criticism and media scrutiny. According to Oregon Live, the state spent about $250 million on the effort, but never produced a fully functional website.

 

Because of the failure, the state will now adopt the federal exchange. To prevent more employees from leaving, the CEO decided to reward its workers. Thirty-eight of the remaining 163 employees will get bonuses of one to three months pay, and most will receive at least a bonus of two weeks as long as they remain with the operation through the next nine months.

 

(Snip)

[Geee]

@Geee

 

Should my head hurt?

If your head hurts, better hope it's not something serious brother. I don't know about where you are, but the healthcare system here is just disintegrating before our eyes. The nurses and doctors are very upset with the quality of care going down down and there is nothing they can do about it.

[Valin]

 

@Geee

 

Should my head hurt?

t the healthcare system here is just disintegrating before our eyes

 

 

I find that hard to believe! We have promises by those who are much better than we that All Will Be Well! That the more we see of the ACA the better we will like it.....we have always been at war with eastasia.

[Geee]

Professors Suddenly Don't Like ObamaCare Either

 

Health Reform: After years of singing the praises of universal health care, college professors are now shocked at how badly it has turned out — for them.

 

Adjunct professors are steamed at the way their employers are interpreting the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate, which forces them to cover full-time but not part-time workers. Typical of liberals, they blame their employers instead of the job-killing law they supported.

 

Starting Jan. 1, ObamaCare makes employers offer all full-time workers health insurance or pay a fine. In response, hundreds of colleges have simply cut instructors' course loads to dodge coverage. Others are thinking about laying off untenured faculty by the thousands.

 

Take the University of North Carolina state system.

 

Faced with $47 million-a-year unfunded ObamaCare liability, the 17-campus system has asked the state for the OK to create its own health program. It says it can't afford to pay its 8,586 non-permanent workers ObamaCare's essential benefits package, at $5,400 a pop.

http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-obama-care/062714-706685-professors-suddenly-dont-like-obamacare-either.htm

[clearvision]

ObamaCare coverage for millions in jeopardy as watchdog finds widespread data flaws

According to the report, the administration was unable to resolve 2.6 million so-called "inconsistencies" out of a total of 2.9 million such problems from October through December 2013.

 

The government needs to determine applicants' eligibility in order to verify they can enroll and, in some cases, get government subsidies. Without that step, coverage could be jeopardized. Critics fear these issues also could cause chaos during the 2015 tax-filing season, as many would have to pay back subsidy money they were not entitled to.

 

Looks like trouble in paradise.

[Geee]

HHS REPORT: 1,295,571 OBAMACARE ENROLLEES MAY OR MAY NOT BE LEGAL CITIZENS

 

A devastating new Health and Human Services (HHS) Inspector General report released on Tuesday reveals that the Obama administration has yet to determine whether 1,295,571 of the over 8 million Obamacare enrollees are U.S. citizens lawfully in the country.

The finding, located on page 11 of the report, states that 44% of the remaining 2,611,780 application "inconsistencies" are related to verifying "Citizenship/national status/lawful presence." Another 960,492 application inconsistencies were related to verifying whether subsidy applicants provided accurate income information.

Moreover, the Inspector General report only covered the federal Obamacare exchanges to determine how the Obama administration resolved verification problems through December 2013. As for the 15 state-run Obamacare exchanges, the report says four--Oregon, Nevada, Vermont, and Massachusetts--are simply "unable to resolve inconsistencies."

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/07/01/HHS-Report-1-295-571-Obamacare-Enrollees-May-or-May-Not-Be-Legal-Citizens

[Geee]

...Federal Exchange Didn't Verify SSN's as Required by Own Safeguards

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — Many of the 8 million Americans signed up under the new health care law now have to clear up questions about their personal information that could affect their coverage.

A government watchdog said Tuesday the Obama administration faces a huge task resolving these "inconsistencies" and in some cases didn't follow its own procedures for verifying eligibility.

Two reports from the Health and Human Services inspector general marked the first independent look at a festering behind-the-scenes issue that could turn into another health law headache for the White House.

The inspector general found that key personal details submitted by many consumers — such as annual income and citizenship — do not match records the government has on file.

It also found shortcomings in the internal safeguards used by the federal insurance exchange and some state marketplaces to check the accuracy of consumer information.

Those personal details are critical because they determine whether an individual is eligible for taxpayer-subsidized health insurance, as well as subsidies for monthly premiums.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/07/01/Report--Health-law-sign-ups-dogged-by-data-flaws

[clearvision]

SOOOOO. Many questionable people sign up with fake SSNs. Get many months of free (probably even critical coverage) for so far 8 months. They finally get caught, but don't pay taxes anyway so what is the penalty? My understanding is that only the IRS can penalize by deducting from your paid in taxes.

[Valin]

Hackers Attack Vermont's Obamacare Website For a Month, No One Notices
Guy Benson
Jul 02, 2014

This story comes to us from deep blue, Ben & Jerry's Vermont -- where the electorate is so liberal that they've green lit a single-payer system (although the legislature keeps delaying implementation because they can't even come close to paying for it). Jillian Kay Melchior reports at National Review Online that a Romanian hacker managed to penetrate the state's Obamacare exchange website on more than a dozen occasions, undetected...for a month. Details:

 

 

A Romanian attacker hacked the Vermont health exchange’s development server last December, gaining access at least 15 times and going undetected for a month, according to records obtained by National Review Online. CGI Group, the tech firm hired to build Vermont Health Connect, described the risk as “high” in a report about the attack. It also found possible evidence of sophisticated “counter-forensics activity performed by the attacker to cover his/her tracks.” The report says that no private consumer information was stored on the hacked server, and that CGI Group had “verified that no additional servers [that may store private data] communicated with any of the identified attacker IP addresses.” But Michael Gregg, the CEO of the cyber-security consulting firm Superior Solutions, says it’s possible the hacker went on to access other parts of Vermont Health Connect, covering his tracks and remaining undetected to this day. “There is potential for consumer risk,” says Gregg, who has also testified to Congress about cyber-security risks for HealthCare.gov. “Best practices were not carried out in several respects. All those point to the possibility of further or additional breaches, because they have just not shown that they have done the due diligence, and without those controls in place, it’s hard to say. The attacker could have captured passwords on additional systems and used those to create different accounts that Vermont Health Connect doesn’t know about yet.”

 

 

In case you're wondering, yes, CGI group was also the technology firm responsible for Healthcare.gov:

 

(Snip)

 

 

 

I would like to say but alas I can't.

[Valin]

Colorado's $179 Million Obamacare Website: 'Clunky, Counterintuitive, and Confusing'
Even the sign in button is broken.
DANIEL HALPER
Jul 3, 2014

Colorado's 9News reviews its state's Obamacare exchange and finds that it's "clunky, counterintuitive, and confusing." The site was built with a $179 million grant from the federal government, but even the sign in button doesn't work.

Watch here:

 

(Snip)