Health Reform News
An important provision of the Affordable Care Act requires insurance companies to meet new requirements concerning their “medical loss ratios” – the percentage of premium dollars that an insurance company spends on providing health care and improving the quality of care, versus how much is spent on administrative and overhead costs. To be sure that premium dollars are spent primarily on health care itself, the law requires that 80% to 85% of the money collected by insurance companies be spent on health care services and health care quality improvement. For more information on medical loss ratios, see http://www.healthcare.gov/news/blog/MLR.html
HealthCare.gov’s insurance finder (http://finder.healthcare.gov/) now features pricing and detailed benefit information for private insurance plans for individuals and families. The finder also provides enhanced information about public health resources.
Health Reform in Maine
Thirteen employers have enrolled in the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program, which provides financial relief to businesses, schools and other educational institutions, unions, State and local governments, and non-profits, in order to help retirees and their families continue to have quality, affordable health coverage. Find a list of organizations accepted into this program at http://www.healthcare.gov/law/provisions/retirement/states/me.html
Several grants to support biomedical research have been made through the Affordable Care Act. For more information, see this HHS press release: http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2010pres/11/20101103b.html
HealthCare.gov has state-by-state summaries of Affordable Care Act grants. Summaries of funds awarded in Maine are available at: http://www.healthcare.gov/center/states/me.html##
For more information about Health Reform in Maine, visit the Governor’s Office of Health Policy and Finance’s web site: http://www.maine.gov/healthreform/
