President Barack Obama famously promised, “If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan.” He later got even more specific.
“If you are among the hundreds of millions of Americans who already have health insurance through your job, or Medicare, or Medicaid, or the VA, nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have,” Obama said.
But as Obamacare’s rollout approaches, we have learned this is not true. Here are the ten states where consumers may like their health care plans, but they won’t be able to keep them.
1) California: 58,000 will lose their plans under Obamacare. The first bomb dropped in California with a mass exodus from the most populated state’s Obamacare exchange. Aetna, the country’s third largest insurer, left first in July and was closely followed by UnitedHealth. Anthem Blue Cross pulled out of California’s Obamacare exchange for small businesses as well.
Fifty-four percent of Californians expect to lose their coverage, according to an August poll.
2) Missouri: Patients of the state’s largest hospital system — which spans 13 hospitals including the St. Louis Children’s Hospital — will not be covered by the largest insurer on Obamacare exchanges, Anthem BlueCross BlueShield. Anthem covers 79,000 patients in Missouri who may seek subsidies on Obamacare exchanges, but won’t be able to see any doctors in the BJC HealthCare system.
3) Connecticut: Aetna, the third largest insurer in the nation, won’t offer insurance on the Obamacare exchange in its own home state, where it was founded in 1850. The reason? “We believe the modification to the rates filed by Aetna will not allow us to collect enough premiums to cover the cost of the plans and meet the service expectations of our customers,” said Aetna spokesman Susan Millerick.
4) Maryland: 13,000 individuals covered by Aetna and its recently-purchased Coventry Health Care won’t be able to keep their insurance plans if they want Obamacare subsidies on the exchanges. Aetna and Coventry canceled plans to offer insurance in the exchange when state officials wouldn’t allow them to charge premiums high enough to cover costs.
5) South Carolina: 28,000 people were insured by Medical Mutual of Ohio, SC’s second-largest insurance company, until it decided to leave the state entirely in July due to Obamacare’s “vast and quite complex” new regulations. Company spokesman Ed Byers said Medical Mutual’s patients would be switched over to United Healthcare plans instead.
6) New York: Aetna pulled out of New York’s exchange in late August in an effort to keep their plans “financially viable,” said Aetna spokeswoman Cynthia Michener.
7) New Jersey: 1.1 million Aetna customers are at risk in New Jersey, where the leading insurer also won’t be a part of the exchange. Just 2,600 patients purchase individual plans with the company, but any looking to take advantage of subsidies on the exchange for unaffordable employer-based insurance won’t be able to do with Aetna.
8) Iowa: Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Iowa’s largest health insurer, decided not to offer plans in the Obamacare exchange. It sells 86 percent of Iowa’s individual health insurance plans.
9) Wisconsin: Two of the three largest insurers in the state won’t offer plans on the exchange. United Healthcare and Humana patients will have to get a new health insurer to buy insurance on Obamacare exchanges.
10) Georgia: Just five insurers are participating in Georgia’s Obamacare exchange. Medical Mutual of Ohio left Georgia and Indiana as well as South Carolina, due to Obamacare regulations. Aetna, along with Coventry, also decided against participating in the George health exchange.
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