ACA/Obamacare: And About Those Secuirty Issues at Healthcare.gov

ACA/Obamacare: Accounting For Grants Is Straight Out -or- Where Quality is Job 57

'The federal government and the states have no idea what happened to billions of dollars given to create Obamacare's exchanges, according to a federal watchdog.

The Government Accountability Office charged the Obama administration and many state-run healthcare exchanges with not adequately tracking federal funding, according to a report in the libertarian Reason magazine on Monday.

The GAO report, which is still in draft form, comes as the administration is taking heat for not properly screening fake Obamacare applications.

The watchdog's latest finding focuses on grant funding for state-run healthcare exchanges with not adequately tracking federal funding, according to a report in the libertarian Reason magazine on Monday.

The GAO report, which is still in draft form, comes as the administration is taking heat for not properly screening fake Obamacare applications.

The watchdog's latest finding focuses on grant funding for state-run marketplaces from September 2010 to March 2015, Reason reported.

Neither the states examined by the GAO nor the administration detailed how grant funding for information-technology projects was spent.

Also, the states and the administration didn't track how much of $2.78 billion in Medicaid matching funds was used to fund exchange operations or development, according to Reason, which did not name the states implicated in the draft report.

The draft report appears to lay the blame on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which manages Obamacare.

"Rather than require states to report spending on specific products, CMS required states running their own exchanges to report spending on five general categories — IT contracts, IT consultants, IT personnel, IT equipment and IT supplies," Reason's report said. "The vast majority of the grant money went to contracts for services like 'systems integration, project management, and independent validation and verifications.'" ' - Where did billions in Obamacare grants go? washingtonexaminer.com, 07/20/2015

Link to the entire article appears below:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/where-did-billions-in-obamacare-grants-go/article/2568625


　

　

　


　

ACA/Obamacare: Phony Applicants Automatically Re-enrolled. No way!?! Way!

“WASHINGTON (AP) — Phony applicants that investigators signed up last year under President Barack Obama's health care law got automatically re-enrolled for 2015. Some were rewarded with even bigger taxpayer subsidies for their insurance premiums, a congressional probe has found.

The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office says 11 counterfeit characters that its investigators created last year were automatically re-enrolled by HealthCare.gov. In Obama's terms, they got to keep the coverage they had.

Six of those later were flagged and sent termination notices. But GAO said it was able to get five of them reinstated, using more bogus information. The five even got their monthly subsidies bumped up a bit. The case of the sixth fake enrollee was under review.

HealthCare.gov does not appear to be set up to detect fraud, GAO audits and investigations chief Seto Bagdoyan said in prepared testimony for a Senate Finance Committee hearing Thursday. A copy was provided to The Associated Press.” - Bogus ACA Enrollees Had Their Coverage Renewed, 07/15/2015, insurancenewsnet.com,

Link to the entire article appears below:

http://insurancenewsnet.com/oarticle/2015/07/15/apnewsbreak-bogus-enrollees-kept-getting-obamacare.html

Aetna Leaving Washington, D.C.’s ACA Exchange in 2016

“A top insurer is dropping from Washington, D.C.’s Obamacare exchange in 2016, leaving customers with fewer options than ever in the nation’s capital.

Washington’s own Obamacare exchange, in 2016, The Washington Post reports. Aetna is sending letters to customers notifying them that their plans will be canceled at the end of this year. The company says it has “determined we can no longer meet the needs of our customers while remaining competitive in the market.”

That will leave just one company on the exchange, CareFirst, that provides Preferred Provider Organization plans, or PPOs, which offer a wider choice of approved doctors and hospitals to customers. Just two other companies currently offer health maintenance organizations, HMOs, on the exchange.” - Washington’s Obamacare Exchange Is Losing A Top Insurer In 2016, daily caller.com, 07/12/2015

Link to the entire article appears below:

http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/12/washingtons-obamacare-exchange-is-losing-a-top-insurer-in-2016/

Uber for health care?

ACA/Obamacare: Fasten Your Seat Belt Oregon as Here Comes Your 2016 Rate Increase

“Some Oregon residents could pay up to 38 percent more for health insurance next year, the latest salvo in an ongoing battle between Obamacare's supporters and opponents over premiums.

The state's insurance regulator was one of the first to finalize 2016 premium rates for the individual and small business markets, which Obamacare covers.

For the state's individual market, the final rate decisions range from an average increase of about 8 percent to nearly 38 percent, depending on the insurance company, the regulator said Friday.” - Massive health insurance hikes hit Oregon, Washington Examiner, 07/04/2015

Link to the entire article appears below:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/massive-health-insurance-hikes-hit-oregon/article/2567602

ACA/Obamacare: 2016 Sticker Shock as Rate Increases Skyrocket

‘WASHINGTON — Health insurance companies around the country are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected. Federal officials say they are determined to see that the requests are scaled back.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans — market leaders in many states — are seeking rate increases that average 23 percent in Illinois, 25 percent in North Carolina, 31 percent in Oklahoma, 36 percent in Tennessee and 54 percent in Minnesota, according to documents posted online by the federal government and state insurance commissioners and interviews with insurance executives.

The Oregon insurance commissioner, Laura N. Cali, has just approved 2016 rate increases for companies that cover more than 220,000 people. Moda Health Plan, which has the largest enrollment in the state, received a 25 percent increase, and the second-largest plan, Lifewise, received a 33 percent increase.

Jesse Ellis O’Brien, a health advocate at the Oregon State Public Interest Research Group, said: “Rate increases will be bigger in 2016 than they have been for years and years and will have a profound effect on consumers here. Some may start wondering if insurance is affordable or if it’s worth the money.”’ - Health Insurance Companies Seek Big Rate Increases for 2016, New York Times, 07/03/2015

Link to the complete article appears below:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/04/us/health-insurance-companies-seek-big-rate-increases-for-2016.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0