Daily News Updates - Health Insurance News

Mass. Medical Model Shines, Pt.5 – Accomplishments that overcame.

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Some positive results are already coming in. When comparing expenses from one year to the next, it was found that “visits to hospitals and community health centers” by those without health insurance dropped 37%. These metrics were taken over the period between July to September of last year and compared with the corresponding period from the year before (2006). With the latest surge of new health insurance enrollment, it is expected to be even better today, but these were the most recent results available. The cost savings represented by these results translated into a $68 million savings. These funds would have had to come from the state’s reserved ‘uninsured provision’ pool, were they not saved. Every bit helps, but still the overall funding isn’t cheap. More than $11 billion worth of support for its dozens of health insurance/care programs is being requested by the state from the feds to cover the next three years’ expenses.

Not the least of this effort is the ‘crown jewel’ of being the first state to achieve a ‘nearly universal health coverage system’. Scheduled to expire at June’s end, the federal funding needed for survival, has finally been given four extensions. But again, not all of the programs are out of the water yet. There still remains the issue of funding for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which are set to expire on Monday. If agreement is not reached by then…well, better not to say. Some of the results required in these negotiations are: Evidence of substantial reduction of residents still having no health insurance and; the Feared likelihood of employers bailing out on providing employer-based health insurance and ‘dumping’ them into ‘the state's subsidized system’.

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