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Confused about Obamacare? There’s now an app for that

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A business group frustrated by the government’s lack of transparency on Obamacare is launching a new app to inform individuals and small businesses about the little-known effects of the sweeping health-care law.

The app and a corresponding website — conceived and developed by the group Small Business for Healthy Connecticut (SBHC), a coalition of small-business owners who united in 2009 to advocate for quality health-care access — are designed to make information about Obamacare easier to find and understand.

“The Affordable Care Act is in place and being implemented, but we have seen a three-year vacuum of very little information being brought to the public in an unbiased fashion,” SBHC founding chair Kevin Galvin told The Daily Caller.

The app is a part of SBHC’s “learning center,” which features a website and Kindle books.

Galvin said that the information is based on guidance from the Department of Health and Human Services, and is intended for a national audience.

“We saw the problem here in Connecticut, so our outreach is to the small businesses and individuals here here in the state, but we certainly welcome anyone to use it and get information from it,” Galvin said.

The app, which is currently available for free on Apple’s App Store, features five portals. One portal allows access to a calculator to help users price their insurance under Obamacare, while others are devoted to breaking news and general Obamacare information.

Galvin explained that many insurance carriers have not been able to offer complete information about Obamacare.

“The Connecticut state insurance exchange and, to some extent, the federal government, we feel, [have] not done a good job keeping people informed as to what is coming,” Galvin said. “We feel there is a huge knowledge gap, and we feel there is going to be considerable rate-shock.”

Galvin, whose group has focused on the effects of health-care policy on businesses, insisted the app is not politically biased.

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Tags : obamacare
Caroline May