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New resources available to help consumers navigate the Health Insurance Marketplace

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced $67 million in grant awards to 105 Navigator grant applicants in Federally-facilitated and State Partnership Marketplaces. These Navigator grantees and their staff will serve as an in-person resource for Americans who want additional assistance in shopping for and enrolling in plans in the Health Insurance Marketplace beginning this fall. Also, HHS recognized more than 100 national organizations and businesses who have volunteered to help Americans learn about the health care coverage available in the Marketplace.

"Navigators will be among the many resources available to help consumers understand their coverage options in the Marketplace," said Secretary Sebelius. "A network of volunteers on the ground in every state - health care providers, business leaders, faith leaders, community groups, advocates, and local elected officials - can help spread the word and encourage their neighbors to get enrolled."

The announcement builds upon the significant progress in outreach and education made this summer. Consumers can learn about and enroll in coverage later this fall through HealthCare.gov. HHS launched a 24-hours-a-day consumer call center ready to answer questions in 150 languages. More than 1,200 community health centers across the country are preparing to help enroll uninsured Americans in coverage, and a partnership with the Institute of Museum and Library Services will help trusted local libraries be a resource for consumers who want information on their options. In addition, HHS has begun training other individuals who will be providing in-person assistance, such as agents and brokers and certified application counselors.

Navigators are trained to provide unbiased information in a culturally competent manner to consumers about health insurance, the new Health Insurance Marketplaces, qualified health plans, and public programs including Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program. The Navigator funding opportunity announcement was open to eligible private and public groups and people who are self-employed who met certain standards to promote effectiveness, diversity, and program integrity.

Navigators will be required to adhere to strict security and privacy standards - including how to safeguard a consumer's personal information. They will be required to complete 20-30 hours of training to be certified, will take additional training throughout the year, and will renew their certification yearly. All types of enrollment assisters - including in-person assistors, Certified Application Counselors, and agents and brokers - are required to complete specific training and are subject to federal criminal penalties for violations of privacy or fraud statutes, on top of any relevant state law penalties.

The growing list of Champions for Coverage is one more example of businesses and organizations across the nation pitching in to help consumers understand the coming options for quality, affordable coverage. For a list of Navigator awardees or more information about Navigators and other in-person assisters, please visit: http://cciio.cms.gov/programs/exchanges/assistance.html

Research Group Assesses

Cost of Health Care

Premiums for employer-provided health insurance have increased by relatively modest amounts this year, according to a new survey, a further sign that once-torrid health care inflation has abated for now.

The average annual premium for a family rose 4 percent in 2013, to $16,351, according to the survey results released Tuesday by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Annual premiums for individual policies purchased through an employer rose 5 percent, to $5,884.

The 4 percent increase for a family is relatively tame, at least compared with the roughly 10 percent annual increases experienced a decade ago. But it is still a far bigger rise than 1.8 percent increase in wages and the 1.1 percent rate of inflation in the last year, the foundation said.

"If you are comparing it to 10 years ago in health care, it seems modest," said Helen B. Darling, chief executive of the National Business Group on Health, which represents large employers. "If you compare it to the economy and what inflation is doing, I don't think it's modest at all."

The data also suggest that the new health care law is not leading, at least so far, to a rapid escalation of insurance costs.

"The critics will have a much harder time blaming big premium increases in employer insurance on Obamacare this year, because there aren't any big premium increases," Drew Altman, chief executive of the Kaiser foundation, said in a telephone news conference.

Conversely, however, it is not clear if the Affordable Care Act, as the law is formally known, has contributed to the moderating of premium increases, Kaiser researchers said.

Premiums have been held in check partly by increasing out-of-pocket costs that workers pay through co-payments and deductibles.

The survey found that 78 percent of covered workers have a general deductible, up from 72 percent in 2012. About 38 percent of covered workers now face a deductible of at least $1,000. At companies with fewer than 200 employees, 58 percent of covered workers have a deductible that large, with 31 percent having a deductible of at least $2,000, up from 12 percent in 2008.

Read more on the cost assessment.

FURTHER READING:

Health Benefits Coverage Affecting Familiar Workforce

healthcare affecting agriculture

Nation's Largest Agricultural Engine

Nervous About Affordable Care Act

HURON, Calif. - Farm labor contractors across California, the nation's biggest agricultural engine, are increasingly nervous about a provision of the Affordable Care Act that will require hundreds of thousands of field workers to be covered by health insurance.

While the requirement was recently delayed until 2015, the contractors, who provide farmers with armies of field workers, say they are already preparing for the potential cost the law will add to their business, which typically operates on a slender profit margin.

"I've been to at least a dozen seminars on the Affordable Care Act since February," said Chuck Herrin, owner of Sunrise Farm Labor, a contractor based here. "If you don't take the right approach, you're wiped out."

The effects of the law could be profound. Insurance brokers and health providers familiar with California's $43.5 billion agricultural industry estimate that meeting the law's minimum health plan requirement will cost about $1 per hour per employee worked in the field.

"Everybody is afraid of the cost," said J. Edward McClements, Jr., a senior vice president at Barkley Insurance and Risk Management, based in Oxnard, about 60 miles west of Los Angeles. "It's difficult when you've got 1,000 workers who've never had health insurance before, to get an idea of what their costs will be."

The concern is felt from vineyards in Napa County to the almond orchards outside Coalinga in the Central Valley. Farm labor contractors generally rely on a 2 percent profit, and they say they will have to pass the added health care costs required by the law on to growers.

Mr. Herrin, who can employ up to 2,000 farmworkers - many of them longtime employees - has been warning his customers of the coming price increase due to health insurance costs.

"It's made for some heated battles," Mr. Herrin said of his talks with growers, who include his father-in-law, the owner of a Central Valley farm.

Some farmers seem resigned to higher labor costs. "That cost is going to be borne by us at the end of the day," said Scott Deardorff, a partner at Oxnard-based Deardorff Family Farms, which grows strawberries, cauliflower and chard, among other salad bar staples, all of which are likely to be more expensive for consumers down the line.

Across the country, employers in many other kinds of businesses are devising strategies to comply with or, in some cases, sidestep a new requirement to provide insurance for those who work 30 hours or more. Some are breaking their businesses into smaller companies, for instance, or even laying off workers. Some companies plan to shift workers to part-time status.

To read more, click here.