Obama grapples with resistance from states, insurers to his health-insurance fix - Washington Post

Faced with resistance from insurers and some state officials to his health-insurance fix, President Obama hastily summoned insurance industry executives Friday for what he called a “brainstorming” session against the backdrop of widespread anxieties about how the new twist in his health-care law will be carried out.

A day after announcing a plan to delay insurance cancellations in the individual market by one year, Obama is grappling with concerns that the shift could disrupt the market and lead to higher premiums.

So far, two states — Washington and Vermont — have announced that they will not allow their health insurers to extend insurance policies that do not comply with minimum standards set by the 2010 Affordable Care Act, the health-care law widely known as Obamacare.

Three other states — Ohio, Florida and Kentucky — announced that they would allow the renewals. At least eight states and the District of Columbia said they are trying to decide what to do in the wake of Obama’s announcement Thursday, which was intended to deal with a political furor over the cancellation of many Americans’ individual insurance policies because they do not meet the minimum requirements for coverage.

Combined with the botched rollout last month of HealthCare.gov, the Web site for the new federal health-insurance marketplace, the policy-cancellation uproar has helped undermine Obama’s signature domestic achievement, fueling political attacks by congressional Republicans and angst among vulnerable Democrats.

In a measure of the misgivings on Capitol Hill, 39 Democrats joined most Republicans in the House in voting 261 to 157 Friday to approve a bill that would allow insurance companies to keep selling indefinitely individual health policies that do not meet the law’s basic standards. Obama has vowed to veto the bill, introduced by Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and called the Keep Your Health Plan Act. The administration argues that the bill would effectively gut the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that, beginning next year, insurance policies cover at least 10 “essential” health benefits — such as maternity care and mental health services — that often are excluded from current private insurance plans.

Speaking to reporters at the start of his meeting with insurance executives, Obama said he and top aides wanted to confer with them on ways to ensure that Americans know what kind of health coverage they can get under the law.

“What we’re going to be doing is brainstorming on how do we make sure that everybody understands what their options are,” Obama said in the Roosevelt Room. “Because of choice and competition, a whole lot of Americans who’ve always seen health insurance out of reach are going to be in a position to purchase it. And because of the law, we’re also going to be able to provide them help even if they are still having trouble purchasing that insurance. But they’ve got to know what those options are in order to be successful.”

Saying that “we know the demand is out there” for health insurance, Obama noted that “despite all the problems with the Web site,” more than 1 million people applied and “many multiples of that wanted to see what options were available.”