The largest insurance company in the state is calling for the closure of the troubled exchange.
The CEO of the largest health insurance company in Hawaii has now stated that he feels that the state’s exchange – a central part of the health care reform – should simply be shut down as it is too troubled to be worth its while.
The website was created in order to provide residents with the ability to compare and shop for policies.
This was one of the states that had decided to operate their own exchange in order to comply with the health care reform, instead of handing control over to eh federal government. Now, the CEO of Hawaii Medical Services Association, Michael Gold, has announced that he feels that the state should cease to pour any more money into the Hawaii Health Connector. He feels that the system has already reached a point where it should be considered to be financially unsustainable, and that it doesn’t work properly in the first place.
Gold feels that Hawaii needs to look into a more practical option for compliance with the health care reform.
Gold stated that “I think there’s an alternative that Hawaii needs to pursue immediately.” In his opinion, Hawaii should request an exception from the federal government from the element that of the Affordable Care Act that would require them to establish and operate their own insurance exchange. He feels that it would be far more wise to allow businesses to purchase their coverage directly from the insurers, as has been done in the past.
In the case of individuals, they should either be able to do the same thing and purchase their health plans from insurers, directly, or the federal government would need to take control over that part of the online insurance marketplace.
Gold stated that “We have to get this done for 2015 and not continue to invest money in the Connector, and not continue to build an infrastructure that’s not needed here.” The state is continually seeking ways in which further health care reform can be made in order to make the exchange more streamlined, according to Governor Neil Abercrombie’s health are transformation coordinator, Beth Giesting. Hawaii has been trying to take steps such as removing the “middleman” between insurers and employers. It has also been attempting to obtain federal government waivers.
Before the ACA there were two choices for individuals in Hawaii. After the ACA? Yup, still two. Arguably only one since the silver plan of one costs more than the platinum plan of the other.
There’s no need to spend $200 million on a website to force a few thousand people to “select” between two choices. A page with a couple of links would do fine.