Empowering patient voices through voter registration
While roughly 83% of adults in the United States will visit a health care provider in the next year, an estimated
News
10-20-11 Affordable Care Act Update
October 21, 2011
Federal Update
CLASS Act
Last week the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced that the CLASS Act, enacted as part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), would not be implemented. The CLASS Act (Community Living and Assisted Support Services) was intended to be a voluntary, long-term care services insurance program. During the legislative process, serious doubts were raised about the financial viability of the insurance program, so Congress directed HHS to conduct more analysis and issue its findings before proceeding with implementation. After extensive study, HHS concluded that the program was not financially viable and announced that it would not pursue implementation. ACS CAN did not take a position on provisions of the CLASS Act during the legislative debate.
Although the CLASS Act has no policy implications for ACA’s other provisions, including the patient protections and prevention measures, it does affect the overall budget. Under federal budget rules, the premiums collected for the CLASS Act would have counted as revenue. Because there would have been few benefit payments in the initial years compared to premiums collected under the CLASS program, implementation would have resulted in a net increase in revenue of approximately $70 billion over the next ten years. When the ACA was enacted, the Congressional Budget Office had estimated that the ACA would result in a deficit reduction of $143 billion over 10 years. That figure has now been reduced to approximately $73 billion in reductions with the cancellation of the CLASS Act.
Critics of health care reform argue that the termination of the CLASS program is the beginning of the ACA’s unraveling. That claim is strongly misleading. The CLASS Act is a stand-alone section of the ACA and the program is not connected to any of the other substantive provisions of the law. Its termination does not affect the implementation of any other aspect of the ACA.
State Update
State Health Exchange Work
Although the vast majority of states are not in session, many are already working on legislation to establish a health insurance exchange so they can begin the implementation process as early as possible in 2012. Since the ACA was signed into law, 11 states have passed legislation establishing an exchange: CA, CO, CT, HI, IL, MD, NV, OR, VT, WA, and WV. The governors of four states – GA, IN, MS, and RI – established exchanges through executive order.
ACS CAN is working closely with Division staff across the country as they prepare for state advocacy work on health exchanges during the 2012 legislative session.
As always, thank you for all you do every day to support laws and policies that help cancer patients and their families.
Christopher W. Hansen
President
American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN)