Millions of Marylanders could lose coverage, report finds
Roughly 3.5 million Marylanders could lose their health insurance or face higher premiums due to their age, gender or a pre-existing condition because the Trump administration has decided not to enforce provisions of the federal law known as Obamacare, a new congressional report has found.
The decision by the
Some conservatives argue such protections penalize the healthy with higher premiums and are unconstitutional. But the decision also has the potential to restore roadblocks that prevent people from being able to buy health insurance, said Rep. Elijah Cummings,a
The administration's decision could open the doors for insurers to deny coverage to someone for having an illness like cancer or a chronic condition like diabetes, or even being overweight, he said.
"You are going to see a lot more sick people who will not be able to get insurance," said Cummings, ranking minority member on the committee. "The Trump administration has made it its business to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. Attacking the protections for people with pre-existing conditions will have a tremendous impact on people here in
The
The lawsuit led by
The pre-existing condition protections have bipartisan support in some states, including
State Attorney General
Republican Gov.
The congressional report requested by Cummings found that 167,000 Marylanders who buy individual health plans have a pre-existing illness that could affect their coverage.
The report found 160,000 women in the individual market could face higher costs or a loss of coverage because of their gender. Prior to the ACA, for instance, a 40-year-old
The report warned that elimination of protections eventually could result in cuts to people who get insurance outside of Obamacare, possibly affecting nearly 3.2 million Marylanders with employee-sponsored plans.
"It would be hard for those insurers to continue to offer plans that take everybody and charge the same if the competition stopped doing that," Pollitz said. "Nobody has really estimated this, but people with really serious pre-existing conditions would probably get turned away."
Harris does take issue with the assertion that Marylanders would lose insurance, noting protections in state law, Nista said.
She said the report likely doesn't take into account a new one-year program in
"That reinsurance program actually resulted in lower, not higher, premiums for Marylanders with pre-existing conditions, regardless of what action the courts take in the federal case," Nista said.
"Even if a judge were to invalidate federal pre-existing condition protections, it would have no effect in
But one report said state law doesn't offer enough protection.
A recent report by
If the Trump administration is successful in the
"I hope that at the end of the day cool heads will prevail and we will make it so that we are not going back to the days when people had to worry about if they had health care," Sammis said.
"It if goes back to the way it was, I might end up with no insurance, in the emergency room and declaring bankruptcy," she said.
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