Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
The Five Major Hurdles Republicans Have To Overcome To Dismantle Health Law
Bloomberg: GOP’s Delayed-Repeal Obamacare Strategy Faces Major Obstacles
Republicans are coalescing around a plan to quickly pass next year a delayed repeal of Obamacare to give them two or three years to craft an alternative. But that plan, designed to create a “cliff” that according to lawmakers and aides would push Congress to get its act together, comes with significant perils. “We’re going to begin immediately to repeal Obamacare and reconciliation is the only way to do it. And I believe we will have 51 Republican senators or 52 to vote for that,” Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who chairs the health committee, told reporters Thursday. (Kapur, 12/1)
Politico Pro: Collins Won't Rule Out A Vote To Repeal Obamacare
Sen. Susan Collins won’t rule out voting for Obamacare repeal next year. The Maine Republican voted against the GOP’s most significant Obamacare repeal measure late last year. But she told POLITICO on Thursday that no one should assume she would do it again if a similar bill comes to a vote next year. (Haberkorn, 12/1)
The Hill: GOP In Talks About Helping Insurers After ObamaCare Repeal
Congressional Republicans are talking to health insurers about ways to prevent a collapse of the insurance market once they pass an ObamaCare repeal bill. Republicans are planning to pass repeal legislation as soon as January, but plan to delay it from taking effect for a few years to avoid immediate disruption in people’s coverage. The delay would also buy them time to come up with a replacement. (Sullivan, 12/1)
Bloomberg: Trump’s Health-Care Reform Uncertainty Could See Jobs Shrink
Six years after the biggest overhaul of U.S. health care in half a century, the industry is bracing for more change under President-elect Donald Trump, who wants to tear it apart. As many as 200,000 jobs may be lost in the health-care sector over the next year and employers will slow investment as they wait to see Trump’s clear plan for reform, according to Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist for Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. economist Alec Phillips, in a report last week, forecast “somewhat depressed” job growth in the sector, based on other tumultuous periods. (Matthews, 12/2)
The Fiscal Times: 5 Health Care Trends That Could Affect You In 2017
The American health care system faces massive uncertainty heading into 2017. Three years after the rollout of the Obamacare exchanges, more Americans have insurance than ever before, but they’re also having more trouble affording it. The promise of health care reform was a key part of the platform that got Donald Trump elected, but while changes are almost certainly coming, just what they’ll be and how they’ll affect you is still unclear — and likely will be for months if not years. (Braverman, 12/1)
Kaiser Health News: HSA Balances Climb But Benefits Reward Wealthier Consumers Most
President-elect Donald Trump has proposed expanding health savings accounts as an alternative to the health law. More than 20 million people now have high-deductible health plans that can link to the tax-advantaged accounts, and the average account balance grew by more than a third last year to more than $1,800, according to a new analysis. But consumer advocates warn that health savings accounts would do little to help lower income people who would lose their health insurance if the health law is repealed. (Andrews, 12/2)
And in news from the states —
The CT Mirror: With Obamacare’s Future Uncertain, CT Exchange Contemplates Strategies
One person likened it to looking at a “foggy crystal ball.” Another spoke of changing a tire on a car that’s still moving. The topic: Figuring out a future strategy for the state’s Obamacare exchange at a time when the president-elect and the Republican majority in Congress are plotting the demise of the law it was charged with implementing. President-elect Donald J. Trump and GOP leaders have talked of replacing the health law, but it’s not yet clear what that replacement would look like. (Levin Becker, 12/1)
Sacramento Bee: ‘Code Blue!’ UC Davis Med Students Call Trump A ‘Medical Emergency’
Calling it a “code blue” medical emergency, more than 100 UC Davis medical students held a rally on the Sacramento campus Thursday night to speak out about their fears for health care under incoming president Donald Trump... Organized over Thanksgiving break, the rally included about a dozen speakers, mostly medical students, who described their concerns as future doctors and as Muslims, minorities, gays, immigrants and victims of sexual assault. (Buck, 12/1)
