Private health insurance holders are being 'bullied' stat : RTÉ

A letter sent by the Chief Executive of Laya Health to Minister for Health Simon Harris claims that people with private health insurance are being pressurised and bullied into foregoing their right to be treated as public patients. Sinn Féin's Eoin Ó Broin said the fundamental problem was the use of public beds by private patients in public hospitals. "This type of orchestrated attempt at increasing income via private patients through means which clearly go against the ethos of a public health system cannot be ever tolerated. "Some of the means of convincing patients to sign waivers go completely against every code of ethics that should underpin a public health system," he added. Fianna Fáil health spokesman Billy Kelleher said putting pressure on patients to sign away their right to public treatment was not acceptable.




A day after Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price refused to say if the Donald Trump administration would fund cost-sharing insurer subsidies next year, Kathy Castor and other Florida congressional Democrats say uncertainty is undermining the stability of the health care insurance marketplace. "Trump's inaction on CSR payments is causing instability in the federal marketplace, which in turn is forcing health insurance companies to raise their rates for 2018 or pull out altogether. "Today, our predictions came true."House Republicans filed suit in 2014 saying that those CSR payments should have been funded through a congressional appropriation. In May 2016, a federal judge agreed with them, ruling that the Obama administration had been making illegal payments to health insurance companies participating in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges. There were 1.24 million people in Florida receiving such subsidies in 2016, according to a March 2017 report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield to quit state-based health insurance exchange

Citing the "volatile" individual market, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield has announced it is pulling out of the Ohio Affordable Care Act Exchange, leaving 20 counties in the state without an insurance option. The decision comes as Republicans in Congress continue efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. Anthem is reducing its 2018 individual plan offering to just one off-exchange medical plan in Pike County. The move doesn't affect individuals or families with grandfathered individual plans (those purchased before March 23, 2010) or grandmothered individual plans (those purchased before December 2013), according to Anthem. Planning and pricing Affordable Care Act-compliant plans has become "increasingly difficult" due to the shrinking individual market and continual changes in federal operations, rules and guidance, according to Anthem.


collected by :Lucy William

To follow all the new news about Health care