Uninsured

This summer, the U.S. Supreme Court could, in King v. Burwell, uninsure 8 million Americans by finding that subsidies are illegal outside State Exchanges.

In today’s edition of The Heartland Daily Podcast, Managing Editor of Health Care News Sean Parnell speaks with Devon Herrick. Herrick, a senior fellow in health care policy at the National Center for Policy Analysis, discusses the fifth anniversary of Obamacare and what the touted drop in the number of uninsured really means.

Gov. Bill Haslam proposes to expand Tennessee’s Medicaid program under the Affordable Care Act. The governor’s heart may be in the right place, and he may have persuaded himself that it’s better to accept federal funding for the expansion than leave it on the table, but Tennessee’s legislators and citizens shouldn’t make the same mistake.

I don’t agree with the New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn very often, but in a recent article he said, “everybody should be cautious about making firm pronouncements about how the Affordable Care Act is doing.” Amen to that.

Of course, Mr. Cohn can’t help himself. He uses that reasonable statement as a launching pad for attacking, “…Cruz, Barrasso, and all the other hard-core Obamacare opponents on the right.” He just can’t imagine why these people might be skeptical of Administration claims about enrollment.

That is what our system needs. Not third-party payers who know they can always raise premiums to cover these ridiculous costs so never bother to argue, but engaged (and sometimes enraged) consumers who refuse to be treated like patsies.

Even if ObamaCare is perfectly implemented on time and within budget, it is unlikely to have any positive effect on the numbers of uninsured ― the entire reason it was enacted.