Tag: mnsure

current events politics

Relative nightmare

Republican candidate for governor of Minnesota Jeff Johnson, in response to the decision of Preferred One to leave the state’s health insurance marketplace MNsure, said yesterday,

Six out of 10 people who’ve purchased insurance through MNsure will now have to go through the nightmare process of purchasing another plan all over again.

This is, to be clear, the same “nightmare process” all consumers of heath insurance have to go through at some point (like, when they change jobs or their employer changes plans). It’s the same “nightmare” my company asked our employees to endure several times over the years we’ve owned it as we faced double-digit date increases on top of double-digit rate increases, all in search of a lower cost solution. It’s the same “nightmare” that was allowed to live following the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

Does it suck? Yes. It is especially unique? No. It’s a feature built-in to the American health care system.

A real “nightmare” would be having a family member with a chronic illness and not being able to get insurance. Or getting into an accident or discovering cancer without having access to affordable, effective insurance. Both those issues are largely resolved under the ACA.

Sounds like Preferred One made a business bet and lost. Happens all the time. Good thing there’s a marketplace where those affected can go and get new insurance.

politics

She looks pissed

ANNA REED/STAR TRIBUNE

This is a billboard that recently went up near the Minnesota Fairgrounds (presumably to be seen by the 1.7 million or so people who will attend the fair later this month).

  1. Around about half a million Minnesotans don’t have access to affordable insurance. They have no doctor, let alone their “own.”
  2. Different insurance plans have different networks of doctors. That’s a long-standing fact. If your insurance plan changes, it’s possible your doctor doesn’t accept it (even if your insurance company stays the same). This is not a phenomenon created by The Affordable Care Act or Minnesota’s implementation of its state exchange (MNsure).
  3. If you already have insurance (which most people do), there’s nothing in The Affordable Care Act or MNsure that changes which doctor you can see.

More FUD from the right meant to scare people into paralysis instead of actually addressing the issues we all have to face. Ironically, a single-payer system of health care would result in the widest choice of doctors since competing insurance plans with different networks of providers would presumable be eliminated. But let’s not talk about that.

From the Star-Tribune.