U.S. consumers eligible for Obamacare health plans could see double-digit price hikes next year in states that fail to draw large numbers of enrollees for 2014, including some states that have been hostile to the healthcare law, according to insurance industry officials and analysts.
Insurers See Double-Digit Obamacare Price Rises in Many States Next Year
Look at access to care. According to Gallup, the percentage of uninsured Americans declined from 18% in the middle of 2013 to 15.9% in the first quarter of 2014, its lowest point in five years. At least 12 million Americans have now received coverage directly through a provision of the law. Roughly 3.1 million young adults under the age of 26 are now covered under their parents' plan. Another 4.5 million low-income individuals and families are now eligible for Medicaid, despite the 19 states that opted out of expanding the program and the six that still can't decide what to do. Finally, more than five million Americans have selected a private insurance plan on an exchange, a figure robust enough to ensure the exchanges will be a stable way for Americans to get health coverage for a long time to come.
In 2010, as part of the Affordable Care Act, the federal government launched the Partnership for Patients, a push to reduce infections and other preventable errors and injuries that occur in hospitals through financial incentives. The results have been dramatic. In three years, avoidable central line infections have dropped 41%. Ventilator-induced pneumonias have dropped 55%. Unnecessary, elective C-sections have dropped more than 50%. Hospitals are also getting better at preventing falls, which have declined more than 11%. Overall, the Partnership for Patients has prevented roughly 15,000 deaths, averted hundreds of thousands of injuries, and saved more than $4 billion.
Most importantly, look at costs. For the past five decades, health-care costs have grown more than 2% faster than the overall economy. But over the past three years, the rate of growth has slowed so that it's now about even with the overall economy. This is a potentially revolutionary success. There is no question that part of this slowdown is due to lingering effects of the Great Recession and other factors, such as changes in insurance design. But changes induced by the health-care law have doubtlessly helped sustain, and perhaps accelerated, this trend. Competitive bidding lowered prices for hospital beds, walkers and other durable medical equipment 40%. Excessive payments to Medicare managed-care plans, hospitals and home health-care agencies were reduced. Providers are forming new accountable care organizations, which are providing high-quality, efficient care by reducing unnecessary tests and treatments, keeping patients healthy, and obviating the need for expensive hospital services. As a result, since the Affordable Care Act was passed, Medicare beneficiaries have seen almost no rise in their premiums for Part B and prescription drug plans. And in the private market, health-insurance premiums have moderated. In the exchanges, premiums have been below the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates by roughly 16%.
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