| Copyright: | (c) 2011 Westfair Communications |
| Source: | Proquest LLC |
| Wordcount: | 593 |
Even as the New York GOP pondered whether to agree to a special session to set up a health insurance exchange in accordance with federal health reform, state agencies are marching ahead with behindthe-scenes work needed to get an exchange operational by 2014.
Under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, states are setting up exchanges to help people find insurance at competitive rates, if they cannot do so through their employers.
States have the option of signing onto a multi-state plan offered by the federal government; in August the National Association of Insurance Commissioners said multi-state plans could have a built-in competitive advantage because they will he able to spread administrative costs over a larger number of insured people. If states do nothing, the Obama administration will enroll them in a federal model exchange.
Like many states, New York and Connecticut plan to build their own exchanges in order to ensure they connect seamlessly with their unique state health and technology systems.
New York was selected as an "early innovator" state entitling it to $27.4 million in federal funding over two years to develop a health insurance exchange, after receiving a $1 million grant in 2010; in August, it received $10.7 million more. The state has estimated a health insurance exchange will cost more than $56 million to build and implement through 2014, after which exchanges are expected to be self-sustaining.
The New York state Departments of Health and Insurance are the lead agencies responsible for planning a new health insurance exchange, in consultation with Health Research Inc., the Urban Institute, the New York State Health Foundation and other entities. Earlier this year, the health foundation launched a "gap" analysis of New York's information technology infrastructure to determine what additional components are needed to stitch varying systems together into a seamless system.
At deadline, however, the state Senate had yet to schedule a special session to consider a bill that would free up funding to complete a health insurance exchange, with Republicans balking at the bill being introduced in the dosing days of the legislative session.
New Jersey does not plan to consider a law authorizing a new health insurance exchange before the commencement of its next legislative session in January.
Other states, however, are moving ahead.
In Connecticut, officials got their first look at the state's new Office of Health Reform and Innovation, which is charged with getting an exchange up and running there by January 2014 in accordance with federal law. The board has begun the process of a national search to land a CEO to run the exchange.
Mercer Health and Benefits L.L.C. is consulting to Connecticut in the early stages of creating a health exchange, with the state having received its own $6.7 million planning grant in August to work out administration, business operations and customer support. The state has applied for a grant from the National Academy for State Health Policy to secure sufficient funding for "navigators" to help people learn about the health exchanges.
The American public remains largely in the dark about health insurance exchanges, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute and Mathew Greenwald & Associates Inc., which conduct an annual "health confidence" interview querying Americans on their perceptions of the health care system.
The institute reported that most Americans surveyed are not familiar with the health insurance exchange aspect of the law--in fact only 3 percent said they are very familiar with health insurance exchanges, with more than six in 10 people saying they are not at all familiar with them.
