Covered California’s Unique Negotiating Power Helps Slow Premium Increases
Other states and the federal marketplace accept any plan that seeks to participate, but California's exchange negotiates prices with insurers to help consumers get better prices. Meanwhile, pregnant women with Covered California plans are being transferred from the exchange into Medi-Cal without any consent or notice.
KQED:
Covered California Helps Keep Premiums In Check, UC Berkeley Study Finds
Covered California’s Obamacare exchange has helped consumers get a better deal on health insurance in part because of its negotiating power — power that other Affordable Care Act marketplaces don’t have — according to a new analysis published Monday. (Aliferis, 5/2)
Kaiser Health News:
Pregnant Women Dumped By Covered California Into Medi-Cal, Without Notice Or Consent
Lynn Kersey has some advice for pregnant women who bought health insurance policies from Covered California and want to keep them: Don’t report your pregnancy to the agency. “It’s not a requirement … and it’s actually worse to do so,” said Kersey, executive director of Maternal and Child Health Access, an advocacy group based in Los Angeles County. Why? Two of Kersey’s clients with Covered California health plans recently were thrown into Medi-Cal — the state’s health program for low-income residents — without their consent or prior notice after they reported their pregnancies to the state’s health insurance exchange. (Bazar, 5/3)
