Here are six thoughts:
1. Throughout the Untied States, nearly 33 percent of U.S. counties will have one payer offering coverage on the ACA exchange in 2017.
2. Arizona has the highest average premium increase per state, coming in at a 116 percent jump. The average monthly premium for the state is $422, up from $196 last year. The average premium for ACA silver plans will increase 22 percent, on average. HHS Acting Assistant Secretary Kathryn Martin noted Arizona had the lowest rate increase of any state in 2016.
3. WSJ reports analyzing what happened in the state’s marketplaces may help legislators understand flaws in the health law’s design and implementation as well as mistakes payers made.
4. Some payers in Arizona priced plans very high, hoping that market share and some provisions of the ACA would help them evade losses. However, such protections did not work in the payers’ favor. The risk-corridor program only paid payers 12.6 percent of the amount payers anticipated in 2015.Tom Snook, a Phoenix-based actuary for consultants Milliman, told WSJ, “The Arizona market is the poster child for the problems the exchanges are experiencing nationally.”
5. Those opposing the ACA have claimed issues in Arizona and other states speak to the need to repeal the ACA, and have proposed legislative changes to expand health-savings accounts and let payers sell plans across state lines.
6. Federal officials plan to strengthen the exchanges and the ACA subsidies will help lower-income Americans combat increasing premiums.
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