Can I get a hearty LOL from y'all?
Blue Cross Blue Shield Association’s CEO Scott Serota is warning Republicans that their plan to repeal Obamacare's 'risk corridors' policy -- a program that funnels tax dollars towards private insurance companies stuck with a disproportionate number of sick people from the exchanges -- could lead to the end of private health insurance:
A major health insurance company is gearing up to lobby hard against repeal of Obamacare’s so-called “risk corridors”— a provision of the law that Republicans deride as an “insurer bailout”— and warning lawmakers that doing so “will ultimately lead to a single-payer system.”
BuzzFeed obtained a memo and talking points from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association’s CEO Scott Serota that sound alarm bells over momentum for repeal of the health care law’s “risk corridors” — the program that would provide insurance companies with additional funds to cover losses should not enough healthy people enroll in health care plans.
“We are becoming increasingly concerned about momentum that is quickly building among some leading conservatives for elimination of the risk corridor and reinsurance programs,” Serota wrote.
Serota specifically cited several high-profile bills introduced in the House and Senate to repeal the programs and a column by Charles Krauthammer calling for immediate congressional action on the bills.
Serota told members that he would be meeting with Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Speaker John Boehner next week to try to convince them repeal of the risk corridors not be “part of their ACA strategy.”
Basically, if insurers unlucky enough to cover actual sick people don't get additional money from the government to pay huge claims, they could go bankrupt (you know, just like all the sick people that they forced to go bankrupt from medical debt in the past). And if private insurers go bankrupt, there's only one option --
single-payer:
In attached talking points, seemingly directed at Republican lawmakers opposed to risk corridors and reinsurance, BCBSA is asking members to argue that eliminating the risk corridors will lead to the eventual downfall of Obamacare and lead to a single-payer system: “It jeopardizes the entire private health insurance market and will ultimately lead to a single-payer system. Furthermore, it will close the door to pro-competitive health care reform alternatives.”
One bolded talking point, “use with appropriate audiences only,” charges that “eliminating these programs will result in massive premium increases and could cause private insurers to become insolvent.” In Serota’s email, however, this point is intended for Democrats only.
Insurers are terrified because even their Tea Party friends are turning against them:
Sen. Marco Rubio, the lead sponsor of the risk-corridor repeal bill in the Senate, previously told BuzzFeed that he was not anti-insurance company but simply anti-bailout.
“I don’t think taxpayers should be bailing them out. It takes a taxpayer bailout to save Obamacare — that alone tells you it’s not worth saving,” he said.
So, yeah, LOL! And
Medicare-for-all, anyone?
Thank you, GOP!