‘I Hate To Panic, But …’: Advocates Eye Tomorrow’s Health Law Enrollment Deadline With Trepidation As Numbers Lag
Some experts, however, say that it's still too soon to say that fewer sign-ups this year mean fewer people will have insurance coverage in 2019. The unemployment rate fell from 4.1 percent to 3.7 percent over the course of 2018, and it's also hard to know how many people aren't showing up on enrollment tallies because they are just sticking with the plan they have.
NPR:
Enrollment In HealthCare.Gov Plans May Be Down For 2019
Former President Barack Obama released a video earlier this week urging people to hurry up and shop for health insurance on the Affordable Care Act exchange. "This year I'm giving it to you straight," Obama says in the video. "It's important to have health insurance in case, God forbid, you get really sick, or hurt yourself next year." (Kodjak, 12/14)
In other health law news —
Reuters:
U.S. Appeals Court Narrows Order On Trump Birth Control Rules
A federal appeals court on Thursday narrowed an order that had blocked President Donald Trump's administration from enforcing new rules that undermine an Obamacare requirement for employers to provide insurance that covers women's birth control. Last year two federal judges - one in Philadelphia and one in Oakland, California - had blocked the government from enforcing a new guideline allowing businesses or nonprofits to obtain exemptions from the contraception policy on moral or religious grounds. The Justice Department appealed both rulings. (12/13)
The Associated Press:
Court: Trump Can't Let Companies Deny Birth Control Coverage
Thursday's ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals concerned changes to birth control coverage requirements under President Barack Obama's health care law that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued in October 2017. States were likely to succeed on their claim that those changes were made without required notice and public comment, the appeals court panel said in a 2-1 decision. (12/13)