Cuomo executive order targets insurers looking to leave market

July 05--Tweet

With the avowed goal of mitigating the damage of market uncertainty, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has issued an executive order banning private insurers that withdraw from the state's official health plan marketplace.

Recent efforts by Congress by both the House and the Senate to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act have made waves, and potential price increases, in insurance markets nationwide.

Many private insurance companies are bracing for losses should the Republican health bill be passed and major cuts to federal financial assistance and programs like Medicaid be made. Some insurers have gone so far as to pull out entirely from certain low-profit markets, or limit available coverage -- the governor's specific focus being on access to Qualified Health Plans, which were made available at low rates to low-income New Yorkers by the State's Medicaid expansion and the ACA.

Gov. Cuomo's executive order, number 167, requires insurers to provide proper and advanced notice of their intentions to withdraw from the state marketplace, the New York State of Health, for the following year.

Those insurers will then be barred from selling plans in any other programs offered on the marketplace, including Medicaid, Child Health Plus and the Essential Plan.

Insurers choosing to withdraw will also be blacklisted from any new or extended contracts with all state agencies and departments.

The executive order cites that under the proposed legislation, New Yorkers stand to lose an estimated $400 million each year in federal financial assistance to reduce premiums, as well as health care cost sharing credits.

The governor's office hopes the new measures will discourage insurers from exiting New York's markets, reducing consumers' access to choice and affordable coverage.

New York State of Health insures 3.6 million New Yorkers, or 18 percent of the state, on an income-based spectrum. Since its inception in 2013, the rate of uninsured New Yorkers has been cut in half, to 5 percent, the lowest in decades.

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