health insurance
Court: State can't cut legal immigrants off from state health insurance just to save money
By adamg - 1/5/12 - 12:24 pmThe Supreme Judicial Court today overturned a law that prohibits certain legal immigrants from obtaining subsidized insurance from the state's Commonwealth Care program.
The court said saving money was the main rationale behind a law passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. Patrick limiting the number of immigrants who could sign up for Commonwealth Care - and saving money is not a good enough reason under the state constitution for "invidious discrimination against aliens."
Group fails to get enough signatures for ballot question to repeal health-insurance mandate
By adamg - 11/28/11 - 4:41 pmWBUR reports on a group called MAIM that wanted to eliminate the requirement than individuals buy health insurance if they don't have employers who provide it.
Kevin Cullen buried the lead on Blue Cross Blue Shield
By adamg - 3/6/11 - 10:07 amYeah, how dare Deval Patrick not excoriate Blue Cross Blue Shield for the $28 million it's paid out to its last two departing CEOs.
But I really wanted to hear more about the guy in Weymouth Cullen gets to at the very end of his column, who had to lend his daughter $2,000 to pay for the surgery on his granddaughter that the giant insurer wouldn't pay. It's an interesting followup to the Herald's report about the guy whose insurance Blue Cross threatened to cut off because his premium payment was 10 cents short. It's stories like those that are going to get the Attorney General (who, unlike the governor, actually oversees charities and non-profits) to maybe do some investigatin'.
Harvard Pilgrim, Tufts Health Care lose the urge to merge
By adamg - 3/4/11 - 12:15 pmWBUR reports they're just too different to make a merger work.
Patrick proposes overhaul of health-insurance payments
By adamg - 2/17/11 - 10:08 amBlue Mass. Group posts some details of the plan to create new "accountable care organizations" of hospitals and doctors that would manage the overall care of groups of patients, in theory bringing down health-care prices - just like HMOs were supposed to do by managing the overall care of groups of patients.
Harvard Pilgrim, Tufts Health Care to merge
By adamg - 1/25/11 - 7:46 amWBUR reports and analyzes the implications to businesses and individual consumers.
No word yet on the new name; if they can't figure out which comes first, they could compromise and call it Brandeis Health Care.
Local small business gets whacked by health-insurance costs
By adamg - 1/20/11 - 10:02 amJoanne Chang-Myers tweets:
Heath ins prems went up 32% for Flour w this renewal. Weighing alternatives-offering 2K deductible plan feels incred unfair to staff.
Via Adam Castiglioni.
Small businesses finding it cheaper to pay state penalties than buy health insurance for workers
By adamg - 7/18/10 - 6:43 amThe Globe reports.
Given the political risks of raising the penalties in a recession, Paul Levy, CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, can't figure out if this is something just happening at the margins - health insurance being a benefit employers use to lure and keep workers - or something far more significant that could affect the national health-insurance system, which is based on ours.
Judge tells health insurers they can't raise their rates for small businesses just yet
By adamg - 4/12/10 - 5:36 pmGo back and go through an administrative appeals process - with the state insurance division, which just rejected the rate hikes - the judge told the insurers, WBUR reports.
Poor Martha Coakley: Even the governor is ignoring her, at least on health-care costs
By adamg - 2/11/10 - 9:45 amPaul Levy, CEO at Beth Israel Deaconess (and, yes, a Charlie Baker backer), explains why Deval Patrick's attempt to regulate health-insurance premiums will fail because it ignores the monopolistic overhead charged by archrival Partners HealthCare - a factor Coakley noted in a report released just two weeks ago.
