The Affordable Care Act - Please use this thread to link to ACA information.

[rhett o rick]

This discussion thread is pinned.

Last edited Sun Nov 10, 2013, 04:33 PM - Edit history (1)

Here's a start:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4010508

Interesting post in that thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4011662

This is the real 'rate shock': My parents' amazing Obamacare story
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024011172

[NYC_SKP]

1. Thanks, rhett o rick. Recommended. nt

[KoKo]

2. Here's one about the Restrictions of Navigators in helping folks sign up

Maybe you can add the title and link in your OP?


How States Actively Prevent People From Learning About Healthcare Plans /Restricting the Navigators

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1002

[KoKo]

3. Testing

[rhett o rick]

4. ACA is NOT actual healthcare. ACA is not insurance. ACA is not "the website"

Posted in GD: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4104945

[KoKo]

5. 2014: The Obamacare Beta Test--Jon Walker reports what will be delayed to 2015

2014: The Obamacare Beta Test
By: Jon Walker Monday December 2, 2013 7:47 am

While improvements have been made to the Healthcare.gov website, next year we are not going to get the Affordable Care Act. The program currently being implemented for 2014 is really not the law that was signed three years ago. Instead in 2014 we are only getting the Obamacare beta test.

In a desperate attempt to get what the administration considers to be the most important elements just barely working in time, huge sections of the law have been delayed for at least a year. Almost all the focus has been put on getting the individual market exchanges working at the expensive of almost every other part of the law.

I would go so far as to say roughly half the law will not be in place next year like it was supposed to be. Two of the biggest elements of the Affordable Care Act, the employer mandate and the SHOP exchanges, will not be in place next year.

The employer mandate was one leg of a three legged stool. This huge delay will cost taxpayers around $12 billion and increase the number of uninsured by half a million.

The small business exchange was one of the Democrats’ biggest selling points for the law. It was meant to significantly change how small businesses and millions of their employees selected insurance to help them better compete with large companies. This now won’t be ready in any form until 2015.

Several other less fundamental but still significant sections also won’t be in place in time. The Federal Basic Health Plan Option, which would have given states another option for covering people making slightly too much to qualify for Medicaid, was crippled by a one year delay. The move could’ve impact millions and probably increased the number that will be uninsured.

We will see big health care changes next year but it will not be the Affordable Care Act. 2014 is basically just a huge beta test with only half of the promised features. We will need to wait until at least 2015 before the law is really in place.

We will see big health care changes next year but it will not be the Affordable Care Act. 2014 is basically just a huge beta test with only half of the promised features. We will need to wait until at least 2015 before the law is really in place.

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2013/12/02/the-obamacare-beta-test/

[truedelphi]

16. Many small businesses are totally fed up with the "ACA"

If your income is variable from year to year, as many small businesses' incomes are, knowing that that situation will probably result in some type of penalty (in addition to the already mandated penalties of not complying) -- it sure doesn't make anyone I know too happy.

My income would be a lot more predictable if the Democratic-majority Congress had not paved the way for Amazon, starting in Spring 2007, to have a discounted postal rate, so that the small business owners then pick up the slack.

So my business pays more in US Postal Service fees, and then we cannot afford to offer free shipping such as Amazon does, then customers buy our product from Amazon, then we have to ship to Amazon at the inflated postal rate, then we have to get a smaller overall share of profits, as Amazon takes an additional 20% out of the mix.

If this were not the case, I would have a lot more money and would not grumble about some of the in's and out's of the ACA and ITS unfairness to small businesses.

[rhett o rick]

6. Pic Of The Moment: Scratch Off Another Complaint: ACA To Cost Even Less Than Expected

Posted in the V&M Forum

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017162490

[rhett o rick]

7. The Neverending Assaults On The Affordable Care Act

Posted by kpete in GD:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024125590

[rhett o rick]

8. Surprise-Obamacare Now Projected To Cost Hundreds Of Billions Less Than Expected

Posted in GD by babylonsister:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024127521

[rhett o rick]

9. The Affordable Care Act is devastating to seniors

Posted by Scuba in GD:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024129866

[rhett o rick]

10. Nearly Four Million Low-Income Americans Now Have Health Coverage Under Obamacare

Posted in GD: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024210596

[truedelphi]

11. Dr Flowers interviewed at this radio show, discussing the ACA -

http://prn.fm/alternative-visions-unraveling-obamacare-progressive-critique-111313/

[rhett o rick]

12. Deadline March 31 is a solid deadline to get ACA insurance.

Posted in GD.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024753448

[rhett o rick]

13. Law of Unintended Consequences Bites Red States in the ACA

Posted in GD by McCamy Taylor

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024837474#post5

[rhett o rick]

14. Yet Another Obamacare Horror Story Goes Down In Flames

Posted in GD http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017187942

[antigop]

15. How Obamacare Leaves Some People Without Doctors

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/10/obamacare-patients-without-doctors_n_5044270.html

In January, a doctor told Noam Friedlander, who was suffering from excruciating lower back pain, that she needed surgery to remove part of a severely herniated disc. Friedlander had Blue Shield insurance through Covered California, California's version of Obamacare, and planned to use it to cover the costs of the operation.

But when she started to call surgeons covered by Blue Shield, she ran into a roadblock. Surgeons who were covered by her insurance operated out of hospitals no longer covered by her insurance -- or vice versa. Friedlander spent days on the phone, hours on hold, making dozens of calls across Southern California, trying to match a surgeon with a hospital that would both be covered. In total, she reached out to 20 surgeons and five hospitals.

"No one could help me. Some expressed sympathy," Friedlander, 40, told The Huffington Post in an email. "They told me, 'I'm so sorry -- it's all just so new. You're a victim of the changes. No one knows what they're doing.'"

Unable to match a hospital and a surgeon that were both covered, Friedlander started haggling between doctors for a cash price for the surgery. She chose a surgeon who wasn't covered by her insurance but who operated in a hospital that was covered. She expects her insurance to pay the hospital bill, but she had to pay for her surgeon's bill herself. In the end, she had to take out two credit cards so she could pay $16,000 out of pocket.

Limit the networks...force patients to go out-of-network. Max out of pocket can be unlimited if out of network.

[truedelphi]

17. This is why it is so galling.

I just heard from a former neighbor who signed up with one of the only three choices he had: Kaiser. (The local exchange only offered Kaiser, Anthem(Blue Shield/Blue Cross) and one other totally new entity no one had previously heard of. Anthem makes it hard to be re-imbursed, so he didn't go with them.)

So after getting the insurance, he goes in to Kaiser with a few complaints. "Well, you need to have a colonoscopy" he is told.

He suffers through that procedure. But when he is told that he has polyps in his colon, he feels the procedure was well worth it, as now he may get relief.

But wait - Kaiser physicians then tell him that since he is 65 years old, their suggested treatment for these polyps is simply to ride it out. As in "You are too old to have any surgery, and since it is likely you will die in the next two decades, jsut suffer with it!"

Apparently MediCare covered the cost of the colonoscopy but Kaiser itself would have had to foot the bill for the surgery to remove the polyps.

This steams him up. Also, it leaves me wondering, as my dad was in his situation when my dad was 82 years old, and his physician insisted he get the polyps removed surgically, both to stop the polyps from growing and becoming more uncomfortable, and also because he felt uncomfortable.

Kaiser is the crappiest place in the world - I have heard more stories about how poorly they treat their patients, and it was also the HMO that caused my spouse's mis-diagnosis and our eventual med bankruptcy.