"Government watchdog Judicial Watch announced a lawsuit Tuesday morning against the Department of Health and Human Services after officials failed to comply with a November 8, 2013 Freedom of Information Act Request about Obamacare navigators. The suit was filed on March 27, 2014, but was publicly revealed today.
According to Health and Human Services 50,000 people have been hired as navigators to help Americans enroll in Obamacare through federal or state exchanges. Since navigators were hired, HHS has failed to provide a concrete record of what processes navigators must go through before being qualified to handle sensitive information of potential Obamacare enrollees. Judicial Watch is suing for information about navigator qualifications, background checks and records about the navigator program. From the November FOIA:
-Any and all records concerning, regarding, or related to contracts awarded to private entities to provide navigators to assist individuals obtaining health insurance under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act; and
-Any and all records concerning, regarding, or related to federal requirements for the above-mentioned navigators, including but not limited to background checks and qualifications.
“The Obamacare navigator program seems as corrupt as any Chicago patronage operation – and is a danger to the privacy of millions of Americans who are participating in Obamacare,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement. “The use of Obamacare navigators and the Healthcare.gov web site should come with consumer warnings. The Obama administration’s illegal secrecy about these Obamacare navigators should make Americans very nervous." - Corrupt as Chicago: Judicial Watch Sues HHS for Obamacare Navigator Records, townhall.com, 04/22/2014
Link to the entire article appears below:
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2014/04/22/judicial-watch-sues-hhs-for-obamacare-navigator-records-n1827493?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm
“Insurers are rushing to gather health information from the new customers they won on public marketplaces in a high-stakes outreach effort crucial to their hopes of profiting from the health-care law.
Health plans need to know the health status of those signing up for coverage so they can project whether the costs are likely to outrun the premiums coming in. That information will be critical in figuring out prices for next year, among other things. But, under the law's new rules, enrollees don't have to disclose pre-existing conditions to buy insurance.
Insurers still generally have only early signals, including age and gender, on the four million people who federal regulators say have signed up so far for marketplace coverage. Those details don't paint a full picture of the insurers' potential risk and may even be misleading. That's partly because the young people who sign up for health coverage may be those more likely to have serious medical needs, insurance-industry officials say.
To fill in the blanks, insurers are calling, emailing and writing letters to new enrollees, urging them to divulge information about their conditions, prescriptions and even personal habits, often through online forms called health-risk assessments that have long been used in employer-sponsored wellness programs.” - Health Plans Rush to Size Up New Clients, wsj.com, 02/27/2014
It should be self-evident that the above procedure is not how the insurance mechanism works. An insurer is not in the business of guessing what risk aspects are associated with particular risks and guessing a price. Rather, the insurer measures the risk first then assigns a price to insure the risk. For example, beach front property in Myrtle Beach, SC represents a different risk and associated price than property located in Billings, Montana.
One can quickly see that the one story brick ranch designed home in Billings, Montana is going to be overcharged to subsidize the beach front frame designed home in Myrtle Beach, SC.
One also needs to pay particular attention to this passage in the article: “That's partly because the young people who sign up for health coverage may be those more likely to have serious medical needs, insurance-industry officials say.” The problem expressed in the passage is that one may well end up with an inordinate amount of beach front property and few homes in Billings, Montana. Better yet, the insurer has no idea how many beach front properties it has acquired. Oops!
Upon further reflection, the passage “That's partly because the young people who sign up for health coverage may be those more likely to have serious medical needs, insurance-industry officials say” points out another possible trend/pattern. How so?
ACA/Obamacare, the supposed design thereof, is predicated on a cross subsidy [the least wealthy and most healthy subsidizing the least healthy and most wealthy] associated with signing up 40% of the insured’s in the category of ages 18 to 34. The current percentage is 25% in the age group 18 to 34. What if the lower than projected sign-up rates, 25% vs. 40%, in age group 18 to 34 is associated with the healthy people in age group 18 to 34 not signing up and the less healthy in age group 18 to 34 signing up?
Stated alternatively, age group 18 to 34 is the prize group in the supposed design of ACA/Obamacare. If the scheme designers can attract 40% of the total risk pool from the 18 to 34 age group everything will supposedly be great and grand and the scheme succeeds. But what if the prized group is not the “young invincibles” of stellar health but rather populated by the "young-vincibles" with non-stellar health that represent a much higher price to insure than the designers imagined? If the prize group, the plum as it were, is in fact populated by the young-vincibles then the cross-subsidy fails and more price pressure is exerted upon the total scheme.
This aspect of the ACA/Obamacare exercise ends as:
(1) the designers of the ACA/Obamacare scheme put much weight on a cross subsidy based on the young subsidizing the old. The scheme is predicated on 40% of the exposure units being in the age group 18-34. The scheme only attracted 25% in the age group 18-34,
(2) the same schemers assumed the exposure units associated with the age group 18-34 group would be, in the main, healthy and with low utilization of health-care and hence health insurance. The assumption is reasonable if one takes the group as a whole. A problem arises when the aspects of "the group as a whole" is supplanted with "the group as a hole",
(3) rather than "young invincibles" populating the 18-34 group, the group is populated by the "young vincibles". That is, rather than the 18-34 group having the health aspects associated with the group as a whole, the group is made up of the less healthy segment of the 18-34 year olds with the more healthy not participating,
(4) the cross subsidy of the young to the old, partially or fully fails in its mission as a subsidy, as the price to insure the actual group of 18-34 attracted to the scheme is much higher than designers imagined as the actual group insured does not exhibit the health aspects of the group as a whole.
Link to the entire Wall Street Journal article appears below:
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304703804579382972774459560?mod=WSJ_business_LeftSecondHighlights&mg=reno64-wsj
‘Late summer before the federal health exchanges launched, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the Obama administration had a goal of getting 7 million people fully enrolled in Obamacare by March 2014.
"I think success looks like at least 7 million people having signed up by the end of March 2014,"Sebelius said during an interview with NBC News.
The White House has been slowly backing away from that number as health exchanges around the country continue to fail and as few people show interest in the program. Now, Vice President Joe Biden is admitting the White House probably won't be meeting its goal of 7 million people enrolled by March.’
‘"We may not get to seven million, we may get to five or six, but that's a hell of a start," Biden said, according to a pool report of his meeting.
The Obama administration said last week that 3.3 million people have enrolled in private Obamacare health plans between October 1 and Feb 1.’
‘Keep in mind the definition of enrolled is a broad one. The federal government counts people putting Obamacare plans in their online shopping carts as "enrolled" before they pay for the plan or check out.’ - Biden: That 7 Million Obamacare Enrollee Goal is Probably Not Going to Happen, townhall.com, 02/20/2014 and Biden: 'We may not get to 7 million' by Obamacare deadline, Reuters, 02/19/2014
Link to the complete articles appear below:
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2014/02/20/biden-that-7-million-obamacare-enrollee-goal-is-probably-not-going-to-happen-n1797884?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/20/us-usa-healthcare-biden-idUSBREA1J02N20140220
“With less than seven weeks of open enrollment to go, ObamaCare enrollment — and payments — have slowed to a near-crawl in some states.
Minnesota's exchange enrollment goal of 67,000 seemed within reach on Jan. 4, when signups stood at 25,860.
But after surging by more than 4,000 per week in the prior five weeks, signups collapsed back to November's pace of less than 700 per week.
As of Feb. 1, Nevada had just 14,999 paid enrollees — vs. the state's March 31 goal of 115,000.
Washington state, meanwhile, was slightly more than halfway to its goal of 340,000 signups — but only 88,071 had paid as of Feb. 1.
The January data available from a handful of states raise new doubts about whether ObamaCare's downgraded first-year prospects are still too optimistic.
Further, a spotty payment rate (50% in Washington and 66% in Nevada) creates a risk that the demographics of the paid exchange population may be older — and possibly sicker — than even the national signup data have signaled.”
“No state has provided as much detail about its enrollment through Feb. 1 as Minnesota, and the details are somewhat concerning. (The state counts people who have completed their application and chosen a payment method.)
Only 21% of signups were in the key 18-34 demographic vs. 35% ages 55 to 64. Minnesota officials have been taken by surprise at the share of people signing up for ObamaCare's richest "platinum" coverage, which reimburses 90% of the covered group's qualifying expenses.
Fully 29% have signed up for low-deductible platinum policies — compared to a projection of 5%. Such policies would tend to be favored by people who want to guard against high medical expenses, while someone expecting minimal costs might go for a high-deductible bronze plan.” - ObamaCare Enrollment Slows To Crawl, State Data Show, investors.com, 02/10/2014
Link to the entire article appears below:
http://news.investors.com/politics-obamacare/021014-689516-obamacare-enrollment-signups-stagnate-lag-2014-targets.htm
