Insurers Poised To Gain From From Health Care Reform
By KENNETH R. GOSSELIN The Hartford Courant
August 30, 2009
Aetna President Mark Bertolini traveled around the country this year lobbying governors and insurance regulators in all 50 states for the industry's vision of health care reform.
It was part of a full-court press by an industry that is under fire from President Barack Obama, key members of Congress and consumer groups. Insurers take the heat for soaring premiums, shrinking coverage and, the critics say, a lack of competition that hurts consumers and leads to unwarranted profits.
Ranking insurance executives, like Bertolini, say they are willing to make concessions and are working to cut costs in order to control premium increases. They say they have ideas — some already in the works — for saving billions by avoiding unnecessary care, coordinating care and pushing hard for disease prevention.
They also have their demands, including the rejection of a proposed government-sponsored plan similar to Medicare that would cover those who aren't elderly.
But for all the controversy, health insurers now appear to be poised to benefit from reform.
"They could do very well. What's being proposed is universal or near-universal health care coverage provided through private health insurance plans," said Linda Blumberg, a health policy analyst at the nonpartisan Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. "It would give them a stable pool of insured with less turnover and potentially more enrollees."
The half-dozen or so leading proposals in Congress all include a requirement that all Americans have health insurance, guaranteeing insurers tens of millions in new customers, some of them subsidized by the federal government.
In return, insurers would agree to stop locking out new customers who have illnesses or raising rates on the seriously ill.
The push by Obama and many Democrats in Congress for a government-sponsored plan — the "public option" — is at the center of the furor this summer in town hall meetings. That vast health plan would compete with insurers, and companies say it would undercut them, and could eventually drive them out of business.
Supporters say a public plan would save billions of dollars by paring administrative costs, eliminating the need for shareholder profits and forcing more savings from health care providers. But as angry consumers fearful of government control over medical decisions shouted down the plan across the country, the public option lost some political favor.
Under some scenarios, private insurers would have a hand in running a public plan as administrators — as they already do for Medicare, military coverage and other public health coverage.
more:
http://www.courant.com/business/hc-hc-insurers.artaug30,0,5054558.story
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