Romney-Ryan – The Moral Healthcare Blog

Health Care Policy under President Romney — NEJM

Also uncertain is whether a Romney administration would seek repeal of the $716 billion in Medicare savings that would be used to finance about half the ACA’s cost. Though Romney has committed to repealing these savings, his running mate, Congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI), incorporated them into his House budget resolutions in 2011 and 2012, with overwhelming support from the House Republican Caucus.4 Rescinding these savings would advance the insolvency of the Medicare Part A Hospital Insurance Trust Fund from 2024 to 2016 and trigger an average increase of $323 in the premiums paid by most Medicare beneficiaries between 2013 and 2022. Romney has pledged not to change Medicare for current enrollees.2 However, premium increases for future enrollees, plus the elimination of ACA-created Medicare benefits such as no-cost preventive services, will test that pledge.

Romney and the Republican National Platform also endorse Ryan’s proposal to convert Medicare from a defined-benefit to a defined-contribution program.2,4 Under this plan, new senior and disabled Medicare enrollees (beginning in 2023) would receive a capped subsidy (“premium support”) to purchase individual coverage from competing private and public (traditional Medicare) health plans.2,4 Romney also proposes to increase Medicare’s eligibility age from 65 to 67 and to provide less premium support to wealthier seniors.2 These changes would reduce future federal Medicare spending beginning in 2023 and would shift growing costs to beneficiaries.

Romney also endorses Ryan’s proposal to modify the federal–state Medicaid partnership by turning the program into block grants and capping the federal contribution.2,4 The corresponding budget resolution calls for cuts (beyond those effected by ACA repeal) of $810 billion over 10 years (2013 through 2022).4 These cuts would mean curtailing benefits, reducing provider payments, tightening eligibility, shrinking enrollee rolls, and swelling the ranks of the uninsured by 14 million to 27 million people, according to the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured.5 Though Romney outlines countermeasures such as state-sponsored high-risk pools and insurance subsidies, both options are costly and contingent on flush state coffers.

The Romney-Ryan Plan to Obliterate Medicaid | Mother Jones

The Journal of the American Medical Association

Romney’s Medicaid shell game – Boston.com

Mitt Romney is lambasting federal aid in his campaign for the presidency, including derisive comments against those who receive government assistance. But he pulled all the stops to pursue federal aid as governor of Massachusetts, even hiring “revenue maximization” contractors to scour federal programs for every possible penny — and using financial schemes to maximize and then divert the aid from his needy constituents.

Wendell Potter: Romney’s Phony Answers to Tough Health Care Questions

High on the list of recommendations in Romney’s health care platform is an idea frequently touted as a silver bullet by conservatives: allow insurance companies to sell policies across state lines. Doing so, they say, will increase competition and, consequently, bring down the cost of coverage.

The problem is that no one had done a study to determine definitively whether the across-state-lines idea would work — until now. And the conclusion of that study, conducted by the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute, is that allowing coverage to be purchased across state lines is much more of a blank than a bullet.

The study also finds that no new federal law is even needed to allow insurance companies to sell policies across state lines.

“With or without changes to federal law, states already have full authority to decide whether or not to allow sales across state lines and, if so, under what circumstances,” the study noted.

Of course, you wouldn’t know that from listening to Romney and other politicians who seem to believe than an act of Congress is needed. It isn’t. State legislatures can make it happen whenever they want, but, so far, only six have decided to try it. Georgia, Maine and Wyoming have enacted legislation in recent years to allow out-of-state insurers to sell policies within their borders. Lawmakers in Kentucky, Rhode Island and Washington passed bills requiring their insurance departments to research the idea and determine interest from out-of-state insurers.

The lawmakers who championed the legislation expected their states would be inundated with applications from insurers far and wide eager to sell their policies. But it hasn’t happened. In fact, not a single insurance company has expressed the slightest interest in doing business in any of those six states.