Tag Archives: Supreme Court

Examining impact of High Court decision on dental and other licensing boards

About Mary Otto

Mary Otto, a Washington, D.C.-based freelancer, is AHCJ's topic leader on oral health and the author of "Teeth: The Story of Beauty, Inequality, and the Struggle for Oral Health in America." She can be reached at mary@healthjournalism.org.

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Photo: Shazam791 via Flickr

When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in February that the North Carolina State Board of Dental Examiners lacked the authority to regulate teeth-whitening businesses, experts observed that the decision might have impact far beyond the world of dentistry.

Licensing boards regulate hundreds of occupations across the country, everything from medicine and law to bee-keeping and fortune telling. Often the boards are comprised of members of the profession they are regulating. And as in the North Carolina case, there are times when these regulatory bodies run afoul of federal antitrust laws intended to ensure consumer choice and greater access to services. Continue reading →

HuffPost dives into public records on King v. Burwell

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About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, has been AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curated related material at healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

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Photo by dbking via Flickr

A key issue in King v. Burwell, the health care reform case argued before the Supreme Court in early March, is whether Congress intended to make certain subsidies available to eligible people across the country or only to those living in states that created their own health insurance exchange.

Sam Stein and colleagues at the Huffington Post filed public record requests with several key states, including some in which prominent GOP governors did not establish exchanges. The reporters also reviewed records from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and more than 50,000 previously released emails from the Oklahoma governor’s office. The requests covered a period between the March 2010 passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and August 2011, when the IRS ruled that the subsidies should be available in all states.

How much discussion did Stein find about the risk of losing subsidies? Continue reading →

SCOTUS: Some things to note as we wait for a decision

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About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, has been AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curated related material at healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

View all posts by Joanne Kenen →

By Steve Petteway, Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States (Roberts Court (2010-) – The Oyez Project) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

On March 4 the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in King v. Burwell. A ruling is expected in late June – though it’s possible it could come earlier. The plaintiffs argue that the health insurance subsidies should only be available to people living in states running their own Affordable Care Act health insurance exchanges or marketplaces, not the 34 states using the federal exchange via HealthCare.gov. They cite four words in the text of the law “established by the state” to make this argument. The Administration says it’s clear from reading the full text of the 906 page law that subsidies were to be available in all 50 states, no matter what kind of exchange they have.

So the Supreme Court has heard the King v. Burwell challenge to the Affordable Care Act.

Now what?

Good question.

Much of the coverage suggested that the March 4 oral arguments seemed to favor the administration, particularly because Justice Anthony Kennedy, often the deciding swing vote on the court, asked some questions showing skepticism of the plaintiff’s case.

But all that tells is precisely that – he asked some questions showing skepticism. He won’t necessarily vote that way. He backed scrapping the entire statute back in 2012 and made clear at that time that he detested the law.

Oral arguments are interesting and important – but rarely decisive. If you think you know how the court will rule – well you have a 50-50 chance of being right.

A few things did come out that health journalists should note. Continue reading →

Understanding, explaining primary issues of King v. Burwell

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About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, has been AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curated related material at healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

View all posts by Joanne Kenen →

Photo by dbking via Flickr

With oral arguments in King v. Burwell scheduled for tomorrow, the Supreme Court will likely rule in late June.

The case challenges whether subsidies, in the form of tax credits, can go to people in states using the federal exchange, or only to those in the states running their own health insurance marketplaces.

After the state cases and 2012 National Federation of Independent Business case, it is the third case that poses an existential threat to the Affordable Care Act. (Hobby Lobby and other contraception-related cases wouldn’t unspool the structure of the whole ACA, only that aspect of women’s preventive health care.)

This case isn’t about whether the Affordable Care Act is constitutional. (The 2012 case was.) This is about interpreting the text, and whether the language of the law allows the subsidies in the federal exchange states.

Learn more about the landmark Supreme Court case in this new tip sheet.

Experts weigh in on covering the SCOTUS challenge

About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, has been AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curated related material at healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

View all posts by Joanne Kenen →

Photo: Seth Borenstein, Associated Press/New York UniversityPhil Galewitz, of Kaiser Health News; Tom Goldstein, an attorney and founder of SCOTUSblog; Christine Eibner, a senior economist at Rand Corp.; and Thomas Miller, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (left to right) discussed how to cover King v. Burwell at the NYU Washington, D.C., Center on Feb. 18.

The Washington, D.C., chapter of the Association of Health Care Journalists had a session last week about the upcoming King v. Burwell case that will go before the Supreme Court challenging whether the Affordable Care Act subsidies can flow through the federal exchanges.

More than 30 people attended the event at New York University’s D.C. campus, including some students and faculty, and it was mentioned in Politico Pulse. Seth Borenstein, a science writer for The Associated Press and adjunct professor, helped organize and co-host the session. Kaiser Health News reporter Phil Galewitz, who leads the D.C. chapter, and Margot Sanger-Katz, a health writer with The New York Times, spoke to students after the event about how journalists have covered the Affordable Care Act.

A ruling for King would affect people in 34 states. Three other states – Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon – are using HealthCare.gov technology but are running enough of their own exchange to be a sort of hybrid. Briefs for both sides filed in the case agree that it will affect 34 states, not 37.

We’re assembling a tip sheet with more resources on the case, but here are some highlights from the event. Continue reading →

State waivers and the next Supreme Court ACA challenge

About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, has been AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curated related material at healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

View all posts by Joanne Kenen →

A recent Health Affairs blog post by Heather Howard (a familiar name to AHCJ members who have attended the panels or webcasts she’s done for us) and her colleague Galen Benshoof at the State Health Reform Assistance Network (housed at Princeton) outlined an aspect of the coming King case on exchange subsidies. The information was new to me, and may be unfamiliar to other reporters too. I’ve summarized the key points below and included story ideas at the bottom. You can read the original (more detailed) post here.

Image by HoustondwiPhotos mp via flickr.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) encourages state innovation in many ways, but one of the most significant is the “Wyden waivers” or the State Innovation Waivers program in section 1332 of the law. They become available in 2017, although planning can start earlier.

Some states are thinking about taking these waivers, which include “exchanges, benefit packages, and the individual and employer mandates.” States can get all the federal money that would have gone into those provisions – hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars – but they have to provide comparable coverage and it must be affordable. HHS and Treasury have released some guidance but not a whole lot of detailed rules and instructions.

Continue reading →