SSDD [UPDATED]

Nothing changes . . .

Outgoing Health and Human Services Sec. Kathleen Sebelius is now refusing to testify before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies, a Senate aide told The Daily Caller Tuesday.

 Sebelius had originally been set to testify before the subcommittee about the department’s 2015 $70 billion budget request on April 2.

According to another aide, however, several weeks after confirming the hearing date, she requested a date switch with the National Institutes of Health budget hearing on May 7. The committee accommodated her request.

Now, after announcing her resignation on April 11, she is refusing to testify according to the two aides, even though she is still the sitting secretary — remaining at the post until her successor, OMB Director Sylvia Mathews Burwell is confirmed.

Daily Caller

ADDENDUM [HGS]: One wonders if this news may have something to do with Ms Kathy's reluctance to perjure herself testify:

"The contractor hired to fix the ObamaCare exchange website announced Tuesday that it would cost $121 million to get the site ready for a second open enrollment period in 2015"

That's a cool $30 million more than CGI's deal. Nice.
 

I'm a little confused, though:

"... second open enrollment period in 2015"

The second Open Enrollment period begins in the fall of 2014, so wouldn't the 2015 season be the third?
 

Or am I missing something?

Cavalcade of Risk #207 - Workin' Hard for Risk edition

Rebecca Shafer hosts this week's round-up of risk-related posts. It's particularly interesting to see such a wide variety of topics, including Wounded Warriors and venture capitalists, Aristotle and ERM.

Do check it out.

Told Ya So (Part XIV)

As we've noted for a while now, a plurality (if not a majority) of those signing up through the Public Exchanges have enrolled in Medicaid, not "commercial" insurance plans. This is itself problematic not just for the sustainability of the ObamaTax, but as it turns out, for the newly-enrolled themselves:

"States are working through hundreds of thousands of backlogged applications due to Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, but the administration is threatening to cut funding for dealing with them."

Since Medicaid is run by the 58 states, this creates somewhat of a dilemma: are the states capable of cutting through the backlog (let alone funding these new beneficiaries) or are their citizens destined to hang in Medicaid limbo for the foreseeable future?

By withdrawing not just active support, but actual financing, how are the states supposed to process this influx?

A partial answer comes from HHS Secretary Shecantbeserious herself, whose grasp of logic (if not common sense) is underwhelming:

"[She] theorized that looming cuts would incentivize states to get their backlogs under control as soon as possible."

Alternate version: the chocolate ration has been increased from 20 grams to 15.

ObamaTax Navigators: What are they hiding?

Y'know, for "the most transparent administration ever," Ms Shecantbeserious and her minions sure do like to keep their little secrets. Problem is, these secrets affect each and every one of us, often in ways we may not even be aware of.

Take, for instance, the care and feeding of Navigators. We've been exposing their potential for massive fraud for quite a while. The folks at Judicial Watch have kicked it up a notch, though:

"Judicial Watch announced a lawsuit ... against the Department of Health and Human Services after officials failed to comply with a November 8, 2013 Freedom of Information Act Request about Obamacare navigators."

According to the Feds, there are some 50,000 Navigators out there preying on innocents plying their trade. That's a lot of unlicensed, unvetted, unaccountable folks with access to your private medical, financial, health and tax information. It doesn't seem unreasonable that we, the public, should understand exactly how (or even if) Navigators are trained, and what safeguards are in place to prevent massive identity theft.

And it's fair to point out that Ms Kathy herself has admitted that many, if not most, Navigators may be felons, as in California, where "at least 43 convicted criminals have worked as navigators and handling sensitive information of private citizens."

Warm fuzzies, no?

Of course, that's not to say that it's all work and no play for these hardworking Navigators:

"On a call outlining its strategy to get people to sign up for Obamacare over the summer, leading Obamacare advocacy group Enroll America said it will get more creative with its outreach tactics – including hitting up night clubs"

Which is ironic, since it's been virtually impossible to actually get through to the 404Care.gov site.

Not to mention, under what scenario will these victims would-be customers be eligible to sign up? The Initial Open Enrollment Period is over, and the next one is many months away. Under what pretext, pray tell, will these folks claim a Special Open Enrollment Period?

Inquiring minds want to know....

Vanilla is Vanilla

My kids love our favorite local ice cream joint. The soft serve isn't what draws them though. It is the fact that they have so many different choices of sundaes and toppings. From a "Mud Sundae" with crushed Oreos, hot fudge, and gummy worms to the quart sized "hot fudge cake" there is something for everyone.

All of that is about to change. Later this week legislation is being introduced on the Affordable Ice Cream Act (AICA). You see, the cost for these heavenly sundaes has been rising lately and the government feels that they need to step in and change the way people purchase the product and make it more affordable for everyone.

In order to make it affordable the government is setting standards for what is available. You will now only be able to choose from chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and twist. If you are under the age of 12 you can get Neapolitan. The only variation of ingredients can be in the fat content of the dairy products you use. No longer will you be able to have any toppings and all serving sizes will be measured to the ounce. Because of this, every ice cream shop in town would now be the same. Prices will be close and the only difference will be in taste.

Everyone must purchase ice cream or they will pay a penalty. The only people who can qualify for an exemption are those who can prove that they are lactose sensitive (yes, there is a difference from lactose intolerant).

For the sake of "professional development" I told my boys about this crazy new law yesterday afternoon. The reaction from them was priceless. The older two didn't believe it and actually made fun of the thought that anyone would eliminate toppings. The four year old wasn't happy. He really believed that he wouldn't be able to get a twist with sprinkles and smiley face.

The next time you step up to order a Topsy Tervy - or my personal favorite the Buckeye Sundae - think about Obamacare. Because in the health insurance world pretty soon the most creative option left will be the basic cone with twist ice cream.

Plan cancelled! Understanding The Full Ramifications of "If You LikeYour Current Plan"

I've written extensively on the broken promise of "if you like your plan you can keep it" yet over and over again it keeps surfacing throughout media outlets. The most recent edition comes to us from a study done by Benjamin Sommers at Health Affairs. In his findings he shares that churn, turnover in the insurance market, is so high that policy cancellations "aren't out of the norm" for people who purchase individual health insurance.

There is no doubt that turnover occurs in this segment of the market. Most of these people are in between jobs and use individual products as a bridge back to employer coverage. Based on Sommers' data in 2012 there were 10.8 million people in the individual insurance market. 6.2 million leave this form of insurance annually. So we all need to calm down about the insurance cancellations as it only impacts 4.6 million people. That's his logic and, as many liberal media outlets are reporting, is the whole argument.

But. It's. Not.

Those of us who understand insurance markets know that this is much more widespread than what is being reported. The individual market isn't alone. It also hits small employer sponsored insurance plans which represent more than 23 million people. Every small employer will lose their current plan (unless grandfathered) over the next two years. This is guaranteed because of the strict requirements under Obamacare. These requirements include a provision called Actuarial Value (AV). AV is the amount of the average claims an insurance plan must pay under a policy. If a plan falls outside of one of the four narrow bands it must be eliminated.

Which brings us to another key problem - less choice. Government believes they know what is better for you than you do. By restricting the AV bands (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum) they are eliminating a large number of insurance choices. What was available in 2013 is no longer the case in 2014. This chart explains how choice is restricted and where plans are being cancelled.

In 2013 employers and individuals could purchase insurance from insurers that had any AV. Every dot represents an insurance plan. You will see very good plans to very poor plans. Now that 2014 is here insurers must conform to the four narrow bands of AV. What this does is eliminate all of the red insurance plans. For many small employers they are having very comprehensive plans cancelled and are being forced to either better or lesser plans.

This is how Obamacare works. Insurance companies are forced to cancel plans outside of the four metallic bands which eliminates consumer choice. It also hinders an insurance company's ability to price products at various levels and suppresses creative plan designs.

The results are less plans, less variation in plan design, less variation in premiums, and less innovation in plan administration. Worse yet, the formula used to determine the four metallic bands will change every year. So, even if you like your new Obamacare plan don't count on keeping it.

My Karma Ran Over My Dogma

In case you needed a laugh:

"General Electric is telling its investors that Obamacare is to blame for recent losses in the company’s health care division"

GE, you may recall, was an early, vociferous proponent of the ObamaTax. It now cites the very real problem of market uncertainty resulting from a law both carelessly and cavalierly written and enforced.

There's a word for this....

Deadline? WHAT Deadline?

Only in DC could this concept make any sense:

"The Obama administration said Thursday that sick patients in the temporary, federal [PCIP] program now will have until June 30 to select an exchange health plan."

Let's consider this for a moment, shall we?

We've always considered the PCIP (Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan) as one of the very few (if not the sole) good things about the ObamaTax. It allowed those with severe and/or chronic conditions to purchase reasonably effective, reasonably priced health insurance, and covered their pre-existing conditions from the get-go. Unfortunately, it was designed with a built-in "sunset clause" that (ostensibly) closed down the program on January 1, based on the (naive) idea that it would no longer be necessary.

At that, the reports of its demise were somewhat exaggerated, as the phase-out was pushed back to the end of March.

And even that was pushed back in a last-minute, under-the-radar announcement that "Enrollees in the federally-run [PCIP], who have not yet found new health insurance coverage through the Marketplace, can purchase an additional month of PCIP coverage through April 30, 2014, while they continue their search."

All well and good (one supposes), but now we learn that, again with little fanfare, the program has been extended an additional 2 months.

Which raises some questions:

First, why would we believe that even the new-and-improved June 30th deadline will be enforced?

Second, and perhaps more critically, just how is this extension being funded? The money originally set aside for it is long-since spent, and I've seen no Congressional activity authorizing additional funding.

Finally, if the ObamaTax folks can't get even those who value such coverage to sign up, why would they believe that healthy folks would be interested in an ObamaPlan?

Cavalcade of Risk #207: Call for submissions

Rebecca Shafer hosts next week's Cav. Entries are due by Monday (the 28th).

To submit your risk-related post, just click here to email it.

You'll need to provide:

■ Your post's url and title
■ Your blog's url and name
■ Your name and email
■ A (brief) summary of the post

PLEASE remember: ONLY posts that relate to risk (not personal finance tips and the like). And please only submit if you are willing to link back to the carnival if your submission is accepted.

Again???

You'd think that this would have been fixed...

Embarrassment of (Link) Riches

■ Say it ain't so! Seems that the Silver State's Health Exchange has a few problems, not the least of which is that it's intent on hiding its problems:

"Confidential documents which appear to be from a Nevada Health Link employee may reveal huge problems within the state health exchange."

See - I told you so!

And what, exactly, are these problems? Well, to start with, there's the case of Lawrence Basich. Regular readers may recall Mr B as the gentleman who's been trying - unsuccessfully - to sign up for an ObamaPlan since last Fall. Turns out, he (and upwards of 10,000 others in similar circumstances), may have been the victim of the Exchange itself, which was apparently miscalculating subsidies and premiums.

The scary part is that administrators apparently knew of these problems and, rather than fix them, chose to hide them.

But according to their state's senior Senator, they're all lying.

■ We've written pretty extensively on the Death Panel IPAB controversy, but as FoIB Holly R tips us, that may not be the worst of it:

"The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation has flown below the political radar. That's due to its seemingly innocuous mission: promoting new and more efficient "payment systems" and "models of care."

As Bob pointed out almost two years ago, the CMMI may sound anodyne - it is anything but:

"Obamacare’s Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation will conduct payment and delivery reform demonstrations with a goal of changing Medicare from fee-for-service to “capitated” or salaried payments. Unlike a pluralistic system of competitive plans, Medicare patients will have little or no control over whether or not they will be subject to these changes."

Shorter version: bye-bye, Grandma.

■ Up is down and left is right:

"Actuary Jac Joubert, along with a pair of Oliver Wyman analysts, say a big new federal risk-management program could pay carriers too much for covering consumers with health problems and too little for covering low-risk people."

That's the take-away from a study of how the ObamaTax is faring thus far. Ms Shecantbeserious (well, for now) and her minions are using a "risk adjustment model" originally designed for  Medicare Advantage plans, which are vastly different than ObamaTax-compliant major medical policies.

The result: decreased profit margins and a faltering - or even failing - carrier.

Perhaps Ms Kathy sees this as a feature, not a bug?

Meanwhile, on This Side of the Pond . . .

Henry likes to write about the MVNHS (Most Vaunted National Health Service). Mike brings us tales about health care  in the Sceptered Isle.  

As it turns out, they don't have to travel that far to find stories about government run health care.

At least 40 U.S. veterans died waiting for appointments at the Phoenix Veterans Affairs Health Care system, many of whom were placed on a secret waiting list.

The secret list was part of an elaborate scheme designed by Veterans Affairs managers in Phoenix who were trying to hide that 1,400 to 1,600 sick veterans were forced to wait months to see a doctor, according to a recently retired top VA doctor and several high-level sources.

CNN

Treatment at V.A. facilities has been a dirty secret for some time. Just a few years ago the Walter Reed scandal made the news.

Now this.

The secret waiting list sounds like Schindler's List, except much more ominous.

The VA requires its hospitals to provide care to patients in a timely manner, typically within 14 to 30 days, Foote said.

According to Foote, the elaborate scheme in Phoenix involved shredding evidence to hide the long list of veterans waiting for appointments and care. Officials at the VA, Foote says, instructed their staff to not actually make doctor's appointments for veterans within the computer system.

Instead, Foote says, when a veteran comes in seeking an appointment, "they enter information into the computer and do a screen capture hard copy printout. They then do not save what was put into the computer so there's no record that you were ever here," he said.

Data manipulation by the government? 

That's a first . . .

Foote says the Phoenix wait times reported back to Washington were entirely fictitious. "So then when they did that, they would report to Washington, 'Oh yeah. We're makin' our appointments within -- within 10 days, within the 14-day frame,' when in reality it had been six, nine, in some cases 21 months," he said.

What is the impact on the health of our veterans?

Teddy says his Brooklyn-raised father was so proud of his military service that he would go nowhere but the VA for treatment. On September 28, 2013, with blood in his urine and a history of cancer, Teddy and his wife, Sally, rushed his father to the Phoenix VA emergency room, where he was examined and sent home to wait.

"They wrote on his chart that it was urgent," said Sally, her father-in-law's main caretaker. The family has obtained the chart from the VA that clearly states the "urgency" as "one week" for Breen to see a primary care doctor or at least a urologist, for the concerns about the blood in the urine.

"And they sent him home," says Teddy, incredulously.

Seems we have our own version of the Liverpool Care Pathway right here in the U.S.

So what happened with 71 year old Navy veteran Thomas Breen? 

When no one called from the V.A. about his follow up appointment family members made several inquiries.

"Well, you know, we have other patients that are critical as well," Sally says she was told. "It's a seven-month waiting list. And you're gonna have to have patience."

Sally says she kept calling, day after day, from late September to October. She kept up the calls through November. But then she no longer had reason to call.

Thomas Breen died on November 30. The death certificate shows that he died from Stage 4 bladder cancer. Months after the initial visit, Sally says she finally did get a call.

"They called me December 6. He's dead already."

The V.A. saga that started on Sept. 28, marked as "urgent", ended for Mr. Breen on November 30.

One can argue that Mr. Breen's stage 4 bladder cancer was too advanced, treatment would not have saved him.

Yes, you could say that. But you miss the point.

No one deserves this kind of neglect.

Especially our veterans.

Health Wonk Review: ACA "Improvement" edition is up

Louise Norris always does a great job hosting, but this week's edition is arguably her finest work. It's full of great posts and helpful context, just a really terrific job. Definitely worth clicking over to read the latest and greatest on ObamaCare.

Alphabet Soup News

From our friends at FlexBank:

■ "The IRS announced [last October] the ability to permit employees to carryover up to $500 of an unused health FSA balance. IRS Notice 2013-71 now offers an employer the option to amend their Section 125 plan to allow up to $500 of unused funds remaining at the end of a plan year to be carried forward into the following plan year."

This is significant because these plans have traditionally been "use it or lost it," and now participants may have the opportunity to roll-over unused dollars.

 ■ "The IRS released a memorandum on March 28, 2014 that confirms that employees participating in a general purpose health FSA, and who have carryover from a prior year, cannot contribute to an HSA for the entire following year."

General Purpose Flex Spending Accounts are those which cover any so-called 213(d) expenses (a laundry list of eligible expenses) as opposed to a Limited Purpose FSA which covers only those specifically stated in the plan document. This is significant because it may severely limit one's participation in a Health Savings Account.

 ■ "Section 125 Plans (also known as a Cafeteria Plan or Premium Only Plan (POP), must follow the general principle that employees' pre-tax elections are irrevocable for the plan year, except under certain conditions"

Generally speaking, you only get to change your "cafeteria plan" choices once a year - at Open Enrollment. But there are exceptions to these rules, although they're quite limited. These would include a "Change in Status" (eg marriage, adoption, etc), as well as a few others. The fine folks at FlexBank offer you this link for an overview of the permitted election changes.

Look out below! [UPDATED]

Such a success:

"[A]n intriguing analysis of Covered California’s state-run exchange found that up to half the 1.2 million new enrollees might actually drop their coverage."

To be fair, some of these folks will find new jobs with employer-sponsored insurance plans. On the other hand, a lot will find themselves now eligible for (taxpayer funded) Medicaid coverage. And some will take a look at their high premium, high expense, low benefit plan and decide to chuck it.

Sounds like a plan.

UPDATED: Perchance there's an even simpler explanation:

"California Obamacare customers are expressing outrage after finding out that nearly 1,000 California doctors were listed on the Covered California website as accepting Obamacare plans when in fact they do not"

As we've mentioned numerous times, "narrow networks" are one of the more insidious ways in which the ObamaTax tries to rein in costs. This is, in fact, a fairly obvious method of rationing health care: "sure, here's an insurance plan that guarantees your insurability, but good look using it to actually access, you know, care."

Dying of Thirst (Literally)

One of the major problems of the ObamaTax is that it does not, in fact, save health care dollars. This problem plagues similar regimes as well, most notably the Much Vaunted National Health System©.

Never fear, though, the MVNHS© has a solution:

"At least 1,000 hospital patients are dying needlessly each month from dehydration and poor care by doctors and nurses."

A perfectly sensible way to deal with runaway health care costs, don't you agree?

Bounty Hunter

What happens when you can't get enough people to follow the "law of the land" and purchase

health insurance they don't want and can't afford unless the government robs the rich to pay the poor?

If you can't threaten, coax, cajole or force them to buy, you pay a bounty hunter.

At least 79 tax service providers, including offices of major companies like Liberty Tax Service and Jackson Hewitt Tax Service, are listed as certified Obamacare enrollment entities in the state of California, according to state exchange records.

California’s Obamacare exchange, Covered California, pays enrollment entities for signing people up for Obamacare.

“Certified Enrollment Entities are paid a flat-fee of $58 per successful application and $25 per successful annual renewal,” according to California Health Benefit Advisers. ”The Enrollment Entities compensate the individual Enrollment Counselors.”

Daily Caller

Apparently taxpayer funded commercials wasn't enough to get the job done.

May I Have the Envelope Please?

And the winner is . . .  

(pregnant pause)

One company, though, stands out from the crowd as probably the single biggest real winner from Obamacare so far -- private health insurance exchange operator eHealth

Fool

The national insurance brokerage firm did something the federal government could not.

Establish and run a WORKING consumer portal to facilitate the search for and purchase of Obamacrap health insurance policies.

And . . . they did it without taxpayer dollars, taxpayer funded road shows, nightly news updates on the status of Ocare and even more taxpayer funded celebrity commercials.

EHealth's stock also steadily climbed during October as the federal Healthcare.gov website suffered through an embarrassing launch. 

Why was eHealth so much more successful on this front? One reason could be that the company's website is easier to use than the federal site.

In a survey of shoppers on the company's website who selected Obamacare plans this year, more than half indicated that they were previously uninsured

The federal government hasn't released any official figures on how many previously uninsured individuals have signed up. 

Private industry vs. DC incompetence.

“Pay No Attention to the Man behind the Curtain”

The government, this time the State of California, has decided that maybe it should ensure that the plans it has been selling to unsuspecting the general public will be accepted by the patient’s choice of physicians.

“A little too little a little too late,” but I digress.

So they came up with a brilliant plan to find out if doctors are taking the insurance by setting up “secret shoppers” to check the provider networks. Seems like I have heard this song and dance before:

“U.S. Plans Stealth Survey on Access to Doctors.” The article discusses how the United States Government is going to use mystery shopping techniques to assess the wait times for new patients to get into a primary care physician’s office"

But that was then (June of 2011, almost 3 years ago), and this is now:

“The secret shoppers would call or visit the providers in a plan provider directory and see whether the providers would take new patients with coverage from that plan, or whether the providers would let patients use that plan to pay for care.”

This is the latest rocket surgery dreamt up by the Covered California folks, who appear to have learned nothing from previous experience.

The short answer is that, IF the doctor is contracted with the insurance plan, then YES the doctor will see the patient and accept payment. IF the doctor is not contracted with the insurance plan and IF the patient agrees to pay the doctor, then YES the doctor will see the patient.

But, it appears that the problem is not the doctors seeing patients, but a “narrow provider network.”

So in answer to the first IF, it seems that there are not enough doctors in the network. So move to the second IF: if not in-network, then will the patient pay and accept it being applied to the out-of-network deductible? Let’s look at the article for an answer:

“Priscilla Myrick, a Berkeley, Calif., activist and plan enrollee, wrote to the board to say she was surprised to find  her providers are no longer in her  network, even though she replaced a pre-PPACA plan with a plan from the same carrier. She said her plan issuer increases the deductible to $20,000 for out-of-network, from $10,000 for in-network care, and increases the annual out-of-pocket maximum going to $12,700, from $6,350.”

It seems that Ms. Myrick's out-of-network deductible is a little high - like stratosphere high - which can be a detriment to seeing her provider.

“If you like your doctor, if you like your insurance company….”

So it seems that the insurance plans have incredibly high deductibles, a narrow physician network, and the reason that patients cannot find doctors is ... drum roll please ... the doctor’s fault. And when you cut off all legs of a frog and yell jump, the frog goes deaf.

Obamacare Ka-Ching . . . . Not!

When is a door not a door? When it is ajar.

Old joke. Never understood it as a child since no one I knew ever said ajar. A jar was something you put moonshine in.

So when is a sale not a sale?

When you don't pay the seller. (Don't confuse this with five finger discounts).

"Georgia insurers received more than 220,000 applications for health coverage in the Affordable Care Act’s exchange as of the official federal deadline of March 31, state officials said Wednesday.

Insurance Commissioner Ralph Hudgens, though, said premiums have been received for only 107,581 of those policies."

Georgia Health News

Less than half of those that applied during Obamcare open enrollment have actually paid for their purchase.

Yes, it is still early, and those that applied late still have a few weeks to pay their initial premium. What we don't know from this figure is how many of the 220k applied during October through December for a January effective date.

The deadline for paying the initial premium is long past.

The state estimated some 650,000 Georgian's were eligible for subsidies so the number of applications represents about a third of the eligible.

What we still don't know is:

• How many were previously uninsured?

• How many dropped existing coverage and replaced it with a subsidized plan due to lower premiums?

• How many bought because their existing coverage was dropped due to Obamacare?

• How many bought plans outside the exchange?

But are we making progress?

"Cindy Zeldin of Georgians for a Healthy Future ... [says] the enrollment number in Georgia “is a good start. We are encouraged.”

“The number of uninsured is going down"

How does she know the number of uninsured is dropping?

So many unanswered questions.

One wonders if the low information crowd will ever acknowledge that, in the big picture, Obamacare is a disaster.

Thanks to Henry Stern for this tip!

Easter, More than Bunny's and Eggs

Easter is a sacred time for Christians throughout the world. However, like many religious traditions,

the meaning and symbolism of this Holy day has become commercialized.

Easter shares some of the tradition with Passover, but Easter is not Christian Passover any more than Passover is Jewish Easter. The central characters in both events involve Jews but beyond that the meaning and purpose move in separate directions.

Easter is representative of the Sunday following the crucifixion of Jesus, son of Mary and Joseph. Jesus was a prophet as well as the Christ, the One who was foretold in the scriptures.

According to our teaching, Jesus was crucified on a Friday and rose from the dead two days later on Sunday. We believe not only in his deity but also the resurrection of the body. Without the resurrection He was just another man.

There were no Easter bunnies. No one died chicken eggs and hid them. Chocolate bunnies and Cadbury eggs, while delicious are not mentioned in the Bible.

Easter is a time of rebirth and renewal. It is a time to reflect on our past and strive to make changes going forward.

Blessings.

My Bleeding (404Care.gov) Heart

By now, IB readers are presumably fully aware of the dangerous Heartbleed virus (well, major internet security flaw). Some may recall that a week or so ago, the folks in DC assured us that users of the 404Care.gov site weren't at risk there.

But that was then, and this is now:

"Healthcare.gov users told to change passwords following Heartbleed flaw ... People who have accounts on the enrolment website for President Barack Obama's signature healthcare law are being told to change their passwords following an administration-wide review of the government's vulnerability to the confounding Heartbleed internet security flaw."

Actually, this is potentially very bad advice: unless and until a site has been demonstrated to be HB-negative, changing one's password may simply open one up to even more shenanigans:

"If you find that a site is still vulnerable, don’t enter any passwords or data that it doesn’t already have."

To determine whether a particular site will leave you vulnerable, **here's a simple test* you can use.

In the meantime, use extreme caution when visiting the 404Care.gov site (if you must visit it at all).

[Hat Tip: John Hayward]

We’re lost, but we’re making good time

Today's Wall Street Journal reports President Obama saying that eight million people had picked health-insurance plans through the Affordable Care Act.  “The point is, the repeal debate is and should be over," the president said. "The Affordable Care Act is working..."

Well yeah, it's a start, but it's still at most only 20% of America’s uninsured, leaving aside what this obsessively word-smithing president might mean by "picked".

The insurance underwriter in me knows what Obama said is sales talk.  His are not the words of a knowledgeable experienced salesman, or an experienced executive, or even a realistic person. They are the words of someone trying to persuade me with weak logic, scant evidence, and a story contrary to what I can see with my own eyes.  They are the words of a man trapped inside some Mary Poppins fairy tale in which “Well begun is halfway done.”  In short, it's sales talk.

And the problem with the president's sales talk is that he is selling a fantasy world, not the real world.  The real world sets a higher bar for "it's working":  people who have enrolled must be able to obtain services they need when they need them; their personal costs counting premiums, deductibles, co-pays, and wait times must be truly affordable; after first enrolling, people must be willing to re-enroll for the next year.  Not only that, but in the real world, almost all the remaining 30+ million uninsured Americans must soon also enroll.  In the real world, physicians and hospitals must be able to accommodate millions of additional patients without harming quality or accessibility. In the real world the insurance companies must be able to set premiums with confidence based on hard facts about the covered populations.  In the real world, the feds must actually, you know, get around to building the back-end systems needed to transmit enrollment info and premiums to the insurance companies.  And of course, in the real world, our president promised back in 2009, “I will not sign [The ACA] if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period.”  And yes, he really did say “period”.

All of that and more is how the real world will decide if “it’s working.”  Clearly, despite what the president wants me to believe, this administration still has promises to keep, and miles to go before it sleeps.  Those promises cannot yet be counted as kept.  That's why I think it's misleading to say The Affordable Care Act "is working."

For right now at least, it's much closer to the truth to say, as Yogi Berra once said, “We’re lost, but we’re making good time.”

Friday Spindle-Clearing Time

Each of these may well deserve their own post, but alas, 'tis not to be:

■ The Obamastration's touting the latest (fake) number of sign-ups at 29 gazillion (or 8 million - I've heard it both ways). Thing is, that seems to include thousands of actual prison inmates.

Kudos, Kathy!

■ From the MVNHS© Files comes this unfortunate statistic:

"Majority of foreign doctors in the UK, including from India, would fail Britain's health service exams if they were held to the same standard as their British colleagues."

But hey, it's free!

■ More ObamaTax lies:

"A New York woman suffering from a neurological disease that has required four brain surgeries has been dropped by all of her doctors and denied medications due to her Obamacare plan."

According to Harry Reid, though, this woman is lying:

Lose Your Husband, Insurance [UPDATED]

Apparently, the ObamaTax is all about the "glitches:"

"More than two dozen widows who were married to retired Madison county employees, lost their health insurance coverage earlier this year."

That's Madison County, Alabama (no, not that Madison County), which had been self-insured. It's not really clear to me why that would preclude them from offering coverage of some kind, but according to county commission chairman Dale Strong, "new regulations in Obamacare would amount to an extra $25 million dollars per year."

Yikes.

UPDATE: Okay, turns out that (of course), there's more to the story. Yes, the county was self insured, and yes, the ObamaTax would have made it too expensive to continue covering these poor widows. So the county "instead joined a statewide network that dozens of county governments already are in. That plan, though, does not offer coverage to husbands and wives when their government employee spouses die."

That makes a lot more sense than just dropping deceased employees' spouses. And, of course, it reinforces the truth that, dead or alive,  you can't keep your plan..

Cavalcade of Risk #206: Work in Progress edition

Dennis Wall hosts this week's roundup of risky posts. One risk, of course, is that one may encounter various technical glitches, which is why you'll need to check back from time to time to see what's new.

HSA and LTCi: What a match!

Long term readers know that we're big fans of both Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and Long Term Care insurance (LTCi). What a lot of folks may not know, though, is that these two seemingly unrelated risk-management tools can actually work together to help you stretch your health care dollars.

How that, you ask?

According to FoIB (and LTCi Guru) Randy Gallas:

"If you're not eligible to deduct your LTCi premiums through self-employment or as an unreiumbursed medical expense on your federal income tax return, HSA funds may be an attractive option. Since LTCi premiums are considered a qualified medical expense, folks who who meet the criteria may withdraw money tax-free from their HSA to pay premiums."

Go on....

"Consider this example: you're 52 years old and looking for a tax-advantaged means of paying your LTCi premium (and good for you for buying at an early age!). You don't own a business so, so you can't deduct premiums as a self-employed person. Your accountant told you that you can't deduct the premiums as unreimbursed medical expenses. But if you own an HSA (or are eligible to open one),you may be able to use tax-advantaged funds from that account to pay that LTCi premium."

Randy also points out that there are are some limitations and considerations for people who have HSA accounts or those who are eligible, and provides this link to a more complete explanation of those.

Thanks, Randy!

You Can Check Out But You Can Never Leave

As we posted before, sometimes getting OUT of Obamacare is as difficult as getting in. 

Well, it get's worse.

A fellow agent in the midwest has two clients that are turning 65 and would like to get OUT of Obamacare and INTO Medicare.

But they can't.

Both bought through the exchange.

In his own words . . .

First case tried to log in (to healthcare.guv) and do life event and change the needed information on the application. It removes any/all subsidy for the spouse who is not Medicare. Agent in my office could have made this easier by putting the account in husband's name, not the wife.

The second, my 10am this morning, was a DIY case, no log in, will have to call the exchange this morning. Same, account should have been put in his name and not hers since she was only a few months off Medicare.

Yes my friends, it seems it is easier to enter the U.S. illegally than to get rid of your Obamacare plan.

Pesach 5774 / Passover 2014

Tonight marks the first evening of Passover, and the first of the two traditional meals called "seders" ("seder" means "order"). It's a ritual and a meal, and commemorates the end of the Israelites' 400 year stint as slaves to the Egyptians.

I use the term "Israelites" because there is a significant school of thought which holds that we didn't really become "Jews" until the Covenant at Sinai.

The ritual itself, at least as practiced today, dates back about 1000 years or so, so it's actually a rather recent addition to our history. Still, it's by far my favorite "Chag" (holiday). This year, as most, we will host seders both nights, with a great (and different) mix of folks at both.

Chag Pesach Sameyach!

(PS Click here for a detailed and interesting deconstruction of so-called "Christian Seders")

Caution, Socialism at Work

Universal health care is a wonderful consideration, but the political dogma doesn't match up with results.  

We were told the U.S. was the only civilized nation that did not have free health care. 

So?

Is free better?

Half of nurses are working through breaks or beyond their shift, revealing a health service under severe strain

Three out of five of those questioned felt that staff numbers led to lower standards of care, while almost half said they were looking after eight or more patients.

Guardian

And this is good in what way?

"Despite all the government rhetoric, despite the Francis, Keogh and Cavendish reports, the spectre of another Mid Staffs still looms large over theNHS. Progress on safe staffing levels has been glacial and that means poorer care and patients still at risk.

"It's clear that despite nurses working through breaks and beyond their hours, they simply do not have enough time to give patients the care and attention they need. That is distressing for patients and for the staff trying to care for them.

Government rhetoric.

Has a familiar ring . . .

"The government needs to face up to the damage it is inflicting on patients and staff, by not introducing legally enforceable nurse-to-patient ratios, and take urgent action."

So a problem created by the government needs a government fix?

Egad. It's worse than I thought. Does Britain have low information voters too?

Stupid is as stupid does.

Goodbye Shecantbeserious, Hello Burntwell

While I realize that it's not a "done deal," the latest from DC tells us that the ObamaTax is in the very best of hands:

"[Burntwell] testified “in laborious detail about what she had found in Mr. Foster’s garbage on the night he died.”

Dumpster-diving Diva Burntwell seems to be eminently qualified to continue the ObamaTax.

Split Personality

The creators of Obamacare envisioned a massive overhaul of the U.S. health care system that

would insure millions. Noble idea, long on grand intentions, short on effectiveness.

Liz Linton feels stuck in health insurance limbo. She has policies protecting herself and her husband, but no coverage for her two children. "They pretty much told me I'm out of luck," said Linton. "If something happens, you're responsible for the bill." On December 16th, the Goreville mother met with an enrollment counselor. She discovered her children qualified for the All Kids state program.  "I signed up," said Linton. "She told me it would probably be a month or two before we hear anything." However, two months have now stretched into more than four. Her youngest child also came down with a case of bronchitis.

WSLITV

The Medicaid angle isn't working so well. Too many people want free health insurance.

But Mrs. Linton should share some of the blame. Open enrollment started October 1, but she waited until December 16 to start the process.

She rolled the dice and lost.

Cavalcade of Risk #206: Call for submissions

Dennis Wall hosts next week's Cav. Entries are due by Monday (the 14th).

To submit your risk-related post, just click here to email it.

Dennis would specifically like to see posts about residential mortgages, force-placed insurance, the participants in the mortgage process, the participants in securitization of mortgages.
You'll need to provide:

■ Your post's url and title
■ Your blog's url and name
■ Your name and email
■ A (brief) summary of the post

PLEASE remember: ONLY posts that relate to risk (not personal finance tips and the like). And please only submit if you are willing to link back to the carnival if your submission is accepted.

Patrick's in The Federalist (Again)!

For the second time in as many months, co-blogger Patrick has penned a post for The Federalist. This time, he discusses O'Care's impact on Employer-based (ie group) health insurance plans:

"Now that there is a tax for not having it many have simply added on to their employer’s plan. As shown in the Kaiser Employer Sponsored Benefits Survey from 2013, small employers foot a significant portion of the premium."

Definitely read the whole thing.

Is your healthcare different today than it was yesterday?

The Center for Medicare services has released how much it paid doctors in the year 2012. The big news is that one doctor in Florida made a lot of money:

“Medicare paid a tinygroup of doctors $3 million or more apiece in 2012. One got nearly $21 million.”

Let’s take a look at these doctors based on CMS own data: “a small sliver of the more than 825,000 individual physicians in Medicare's claims data base — just 344 physicians — took in top dollar, at least $3 million apiece for a total of nearly $1.5 billion.”

So if only 344 physicians earn the top dollar out of 825,000 physicians how much did the other 824,656 physicians make?

“The median payment — the point at which half the amounts are higher and half are lower — was $30,265.”

While we don’t know what the other physicians made, we do know that the median amount paid to all physicians was $30,265. Medicare makes up about 30% of the payer mix for an average physician’s office. So what we can concur from this information, from the most transparent administration in the history of America, is that 30% of a physician’s revenue was approximately $30,000. Does this information in any way change how you choose a doctor?

“Employers, insurers, consumer groups and media organizations pressed for release. Together with other sources of information, they argued that the data could help guide patients to doctors who provide quality, cost-effective care”

An argument for releasing this information is so consumers can be better educated on choosing their doctors based on how much Medicare pays the doctor for the service provided. One piece of insight already data mined from all this information is that Medicare pays for cataracts and cancer treatment.

“In the $3 million-plus club, 151 ophthalmologists — eye specialists — accounted for nearly $658 million in Medicare payments, leading other disciplines. Cancer doctors rounded out the top four specialty groups, accounting for a combined total of more than $477 million in payments.”

So using the rationale that this data will allow consumers better decision-making on choosing physicians, are we shocked that Medicare -  insurance for the elderly - pays out a significant amount of money for cataracts and cancer treatment, both illnesses of the elderly?

Having been both a provider and an administrator in the medical field for close to 15 years, what this information tells me is that doctors are for the most part underpaid by Medicare. If the median amount is $30,000 that any one physician makes in treating Medicare patients and the Medicare population is rising, then it is obvious that the reimbursement rates are lowering. This is exactly what is been happening since the year 2003 with a Medicare fee schedule that, while it does not cut, it does not give raises. As a medical administrator, all this information has done is prove to me that Medicare is not adequately paying for the work performed by physicians.