Losses widen for health insurers in Minnesota’s individual market
The losses drove a negative operating margin overall for
Views differed Friday about whether the 2015 results suggest another round of big premium increases are on the horizon in the individual market, where about 6 percent of state residents buy coverage.
Either way, the general trend likely continues of insurers selling more health plans with larger deductibles and limited choices in doctors and hospitals, said
"Everything that's going on is reducing the value of the product that you're getting for your premium dollars," Feldman said. "That contributes to the declining enrollment of the healthier and younger people."
About 300,000 Minnesotans buy coverage in what's known as the "individual market," where people get health insurance outside of employer groups and government programs.
Nonprofit health insurers lost
The council's numbers reflect financial performance for seven health insurers:
Losses in the individual market during 2014 and 2015 would have been higher, the trade group said, except for financial safety nets for health insurers that are built into the federal Affordable Care Act.
Questioning the system
Over the last five months, health insurers across the country have reported continuing losses for 2015 in the individual market, which includes new health exchange marketplaces created by the federal health law. The losses have prompted insurers like
Even so, the off-exchange market is undergoing health law changes, too, since starting in 2014 the Affordable Care Act forced insurers to issue coverage to people without regard to health status. Before 2014, preexisting condition exclusions were a key tool for health insurers to limit costs in the state's individual market.
This week, the national
"It's taking longer to adjust to the new individual market," said
Overall, health insurers posted an operating loss of
There's no talk at
"We think that the market is starting to stabilize," Keefer said. "We shouldn't rush into anything."
Next year's premiums
At
Filings with regulators for 2017 premium rates will be submitted later this spring, and will take into account financial performance thus far in 2016.
While that gives reason for hope when it comes to 2017 premiums, there also are factors pushing in the other direction. Medical cost trends continue to increase, and one of the financial safety nets for insurers that was created by the health law goes away.
Plus, there's all the recent noise from health plans about financial losses.
"I don't know if we can say the magnitude of that increase at this point," said
Twitter: @chrissnowbeck
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