The Californian perspective of the Affordable Care Act

Though the Affordable Care Act (ACA) may be a federal healthcare system overhaul, each state is experiencing it in its own way, and though Californians have already started seeing some differences since the act went into effect in March 2010, there will be a great deal more by the time it has been fully implemented in January 2014. So far, Californian health care has seen a few important changes. These include: • Ensuring that no new health insurance policies can include lifetime caps on benefits, so that individuals who are…

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Millions of Americans may receive rebates from insurers this year

Before the summer draws to a close, millions of people across the United States will be receiving rebates from their insurers, due to the new federal healthcare reform requirements that have placed strict rules on the way that insurance companies spend their earnings. This regulation is not without opposition. The entire insurance industry, along with a large number of state officials, have been battling this rule for some time. Based on the federal regulations that went into effect at the end of 2011, health insurance companies are required to spend…

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Report shows interest increasing for individual and group health insurance exchanges

JD Power and Associates has released its 2012 U.S. Member Health Plan Study and it revealed that in the face of the impact of the reforms to healthcare, almost four in every ten members of an employee sponsored health plan have said that they would use a health insurance exchange to shop for their insurance coverage if the opportunity was available. This is now the sixth study of its kind, which measures the satisfaction among the members of 141 different health plans within 17 American regions by looking into seven…

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Obama administration issues new rules for state healthcare exchanges

The Obama administration has released a new set of rules for the states that involve broad new operating regulations for their healthcare exchanges. These state-run health insurance exchanges make up the heart of the system’s overhaul from 2010, which will be facing hearings in the Supreme Court before the end of the month. These rules, which were issued by the Department of Health and Human Services, have been long awaited by the states, and are designed to provide their officials and lawmakers with greater flexibility on the federal deadlines that…

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White House to use upcoming Supreme Court healthcare law arguments to shape public opinion

The White House has started the use of an aggressive campaign that it hopes will help to shape the opinion of the public about the healthcare law that is the heart of the debates for the White House and Congress, by using arguments that will come up very soon in the Supreme Court. Last week, officials from the White House summoned the leaders of dozens of different nonprofit organizations that are firm backers of the healthcare reforms, in order to help them to develop their strategy for press conferences, a…

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