The Trump administration continued its attempt to weaken the ACA (Affordable Care Act) before Election Day by giving Georgia's controversial request to alter its Obamacare exchange a stamp of approval. On Sunday, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services permitted the state to discontinue using the federal exchange, Healthcare.gov, to enroll in the individual market and shift to a private sector Georgia Access Model from 2023.
State officials think this move will allow residents to access a wider range of choices from agents, web brokers, and health insurance companies, offering greater incentive to enroll consumers in coverage. The officials suggest the move will increase enrollment by a noteworthy 25,000 people while bringing the premiums significantly down, CNN reported.
On the other hand, advocates have raised concerns regarding the waiver that they believe could transfer healthier people to less inclusive, non-Obamacare plans. As a result, those with pre-existing conditions would end up facing higher premiums for the Affordable Care Act policies. On top of that, advocates are concerned that consumers could sign-up for low-cut policies without even realizing it.
Senior policy analyst at the left-leaning CBPP (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities) pointed out that consumers could take up insurance plans that do not cover everything they think it would cover. She said that the waiver would also eliminate their ability to see all their options on a single website, leaving them no choice but to navigate a broken system of insurers and brokers, which happened before the landmark health reform law.
Straw also suggested that the waiver could reduce coverage but raise premiums. Moreover, the waiver does not meet the federal requirements for it to be approved, noting that it does not encompass many people with the same low-priced and all-inclusive coverage as without the waiver. This is likely to result in the approval of legal challenges.
The agency paved the way for states to make Obamacare alternatives two years ago. With America's third-highest uninsured rate at 13.4 percent, the Peach State is the first to take advantage of this power in a bid to improve its individual market. Nearly 433,000 Georgians had enrolled in Obamacare exchange plans, as of Feb., according to federal data.
This approval was given on the same day as Obamacare open enrollment for next year began, and just 10 days ahead of the Supreme Court's oral arguments hearing in a case that could eliminate the law.https://edition.cnn.com/2020/11/02/politics/affordable-care-act-georgia-obamacare/index.html