State Officials Seek To Expand Low-Income Workers’ Coverage
California policymakers are grappling with how to determine the best way to help low-income workers obtain health coverage, the Ventura County Star reports.
Many low-income workers are uninsured but earn too much to qualify for Medi-Cal, California's Medicaid program.
Meanwhile, the state is preparing to add as many as three million new Medi-Cal beneficiaries under the federal health reform law and open the Health Benefit Exchange, which will be tasked with helping as many as two million Californians purchase private health insurance.
Basic Health Program Option
Senate Health Committee Chair Ed Hernandez (D-West Covina) has introduced a bill (SB 703) that would create a state-run Basic Health Program as an alternative to the state's health insurance exchange.
The plan would be open only to Californians who have incomes between 133% and 200% of the federal poverty level -- or between $14,484 and $21,780 annually for individuals.
Hernandez said he thinks the basic plan would improve the insurance risk pool.
John Ramey -- executive director of Local Health Plans of California, an association of safety-net health plans that supports SB 703 -- said the plan could make coverage more affordable for consumers while offering health care provider payments rates that are higher than Medi-Cal rates.
The plan would become effective in 2014, at the same time the health insurance exchange is slated to become operational.
Opposing the Plan
Health Benefit Exchange officials have expressed concern that creating the basic plan could reduce the pool of consumers who would purchase plans through the insurance exchange.
They added that the basic plan could make it more difficult to negotiate low prices for the exchange.
They also have said a lack of federal guidelines on the basic plan raises questions as to the program's risks and benefits.
Next Up
The Basic Health Program bill is before the Assembly Committee on Appropriations.
Hernandez said he will push to get the bill passed this year (Herdt, Ventura County Star, 8/14).
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