Tag Archives: association health plans

Reporter finds reviewing comments on federal proposals provided insight into what was to come

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What can journalists learn from reading the comments that health care professionals send to federal agencies that propose new rules for health insurers? The short answer is: quite a lot.

Last year, Noam N. Levey poured over about 10,000 comments from health care provider organizations and other groups submitted to federal agencies about their concerns regarding the Trump Administration’s plans to revise the rules for short-term health insurance plans and association health plans. What Levey found was almost unanimous opposition to both proposals. In a new tip sheet, Levey explained what he found while reviewing the comments on both proposals and offered ideas that may be useful for other journalists considering doing a similar review. Continue reading →

Joseph Burns (@jburns18), an independent journalist who resides in Brewster, Massachusetts, is AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform. He welcomes questions and suggestions and tip sheets at joseph@healthjournalism.org.

Digging into stakeholders’ comments for insight into AHPs

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Photo: Viewminder via Flickr

When Noam N. Levey was preparing to write about association health plans for The Los Angeles Times, he mined one of the best sources available: the comments on the federal Department of Labor’s site.

The comments on proposed DOL rules on the shed light on how health insurers and other organizations viewed how AHPs would work. When the department issued the final rules in June, Levey was prepared to write a well-sourced article about the advantages and disadvantages of AHPs. Continue reading →

Joseph Burns (@jburns18), an independent journalist who resides in Brewster, Massachusetts, is AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform. He welcomes questions and suggestions and tip sheets at joseph@healthjournalism.org.

Understanding the new rules for Association Health Plans

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Health care researcher Sabrina Corlette told us about Short-Term Limited-Duration Plans and Association Health Plans – two options allowed by the Trump administration that may undermine the ACA markets – during a webcast in July. You can see her slides and listen to the webcast here.

Corlette, a research professor at Georgetown’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms (CHIR) and a former Senate health policy aide, (more on her background here) covered a lot of ground – and a related CMS rule was posted soon after her talk. So we’ve broken this up into two blog posts, this one about Association Health Plans, or AHPS, and the next on Short-Term Limited-Duration Plans. Continue reading →

Contributing editor to Politico Magazine and former health care editor-at-large, Politico, Commonwealth Fund journalist in residence and assistant lecturer at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Tennessee provides possible preview of health insurance markets

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photophone02 via Wikimedia

President Trump says he wants to encourage the formation of “association health plans” that would better enable small employers to band together to purchase more affordable health insurance in the large-group market. On Jan. 4, the Department of Labor published for public comment a proposed rule for such entities, also known as small business health plans.

What will these health plans, which typically would organize under the umbrella of a trade group or other association, look like? Continue reading →

Contributing editor to Politico Magazine and former health care editor-at-large, Politico, Commonwealth Fund journalist in residence and assistant lecturer at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.