Do you want to have a better understanding of how the Medicaid program affects adults with disabilities and what the impact the American Health Care Act (AHCA) would have? The Kaiser Family Foundation has a new issue brief which addresses many of these issues. To read more about the issue brief or to download a copy, check out our news item here.
The National Health Law Program (NHeLP) also did an analysis of the AHCA and what it would mean for Medicaid. Their issue brief looks at the top 10 changes which would occur under the AHCA. To download a copy of this issue brief, click here.
Last week, we highlighted the ACA replacement bill which was introduced in the House as the American Health Care Act (AHCA). This week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) issued its analysis of the AHCA. To download a copy of the CBO report, click here.
For an analysis of the CBO report, check out Tim Jost’s blog post on Health Affairs entitled “CBO Projects Coverage Losses, Cost Savings From AHCA; Administration Signals Flexibility To Governors On Waivers” by clicking here.
As for the AHCA, be sure to check out our blog post from last week entitled “What the AHCA Would Mean for People with Disabilities.” In the blog, we review the AHCA against the eight principles we outlined in our NDNRC statement entitled “Preserve the Protections Provided by the Affordable Care Act.” To read the blog post on the AHCA, click here. The NDNRC statement outlining our eight principles can be found on our website where it is also available in a PDF download by clicking here.
If you want to get involved with our efforts to preserve the protections in the ACA and the Medicaid program, AAHD has an action alert which provides steps you can take to contact your Congressman or post on social media. For the AAHD action alert, click here.
If you are interested in comparing the ACA with the AHCA, you can check out the interactive tool from the Kaiser Family Foundation which allows you to compare the ACA and several of the proposed replacement plans, including the AHCA. That resource is available here.
With all the attention on the AHCA, the Georgetown University Center on Health Insurance Reforms (CHIR) takes a look at some other laws which received committee attention in the House of Representatives and would affect employer-based health coverage. Included in these bills is a law which would reduce the protections in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) as they relate to employee wellness programs. To read the CHIR blog post on this, click here.
This week, CMS released its final report on the open enrollment period for 2017. The report shows that approximately 12.2 million people enrolled in plans in both the federally facilitated and state-based marketplaces. The CMS press release also has links to data which shows enrollment at the state, county and ZIP Code level. To read the press release from CMS on the report, click here.
Tim Jost from Health Affairs also has an analysis of the CMS enrollment report. That analysis is available on the Health Affairs blog here.
The University of Washington, Healthy Aging & Physical Disability, Rehabilitation Research Training Center (RRTC) has a new plain language summary entitled “Resilience Can Boost Your Quality of Life Regardless of Your Symptoms.” To read the summary click here.
Are you looking for local partners to help with outreach to the disability community? The NDNRC has Community Outreach Collaboratives (COCs) which work to increase collaborations in the community, dissemination and outreach efforts and enrollment of people with disabilities in the ACA marketplace. To find a COC, click here.
To access the archives for our weekly updates click here.
The NDNRC is an initiative aimed at providing cross-disability information and support to Navigators and other enrollment specialists thereby ensuring people with disabilities receive accurate information when selecting and enrolling in insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplaces. The NDNRC website can be found at: https://nationaldisabilitynavigator.org/.