The Senate has failed to advance two competing partisan bills to address healthcare costs ahead of significant price hikes for more than 20 million Americans who buy healthcare plans through the ACA marketplace CBS News reported Dec. 11.
Here are five things to know about the failed vote and what happens next:
1. The vote on advancing the GOP bill was 51 to 48, with one Republican voting alongside Democrats. The vote on advancing the Democratic bill was also 51 to 48, with four Republicans joining Democrats to support an extension of the ACA tax credits that are set to expire Dec. 31.
2. While Senate Democrats advocated for a three-year ACA tax credit extension, Republicans pitched an alternative focusing on health savings accounts.
3. Earlier this fall, the Senate passed a funding bill that excluded the subsidies. A Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll reported that most voters supported ending the government shutdown without them.
4. Amid the uncertainty, ACA premiums have been on the rise. A recent KFF survey showed most ACA enrollees would consider picking up extra work if healthcare costs were to increase by $1,000 per year. In October, another KFF poll found over 75% of adults supported keeping the credits.
5. The failed vote comes at a time when healthcare organizations, physicians and ASC leaders “uncertainty around the exchange plans and the Affordable Care Act — what changes are going to occur, how many people are going to become uninsured or underinsured,” Eugenio Hernandez. MD, chief medical officer of Gastro Health, told Becker’s. “That’s less patient volume that we will see.”
