California Watch
News stories in this section spotlight activities in California, including actions by the state Assembly and state Senate; proposed legislation; regulators like the Department of Managed Health Care and Department of Insurance; and the state ACA exchange, Covered California.
“What I worry about the most is the agents and brokers” selling the plans, Kreidler said. “They are looking at the [large] commission, and that blinds them to their legal responsibility” to inform consumers about the limitations of the short-term plans.
California doctors — young and old — advocated on behalf of the single-payer advocates during the debate, said Dr. Anna Yap, 26, an emergency medicine resident at UCLA, who served as a medical student delegate to the AMA until June.
A group that’s buying ads to try to elevate the issue of high drug prices in the midterm elections has identified its latest target: a Democratic congresswoman from Silicon Valley who wants to lead on health care issues.
For those who make too much money to qualify for health insurance subsidies on the individual market, there may be no Goldilocks moment when shopping for a plan. No choice is just right.
Four years ago, after leaving her career at a medical devices company to raise her children, Ashley Hutton Stanfield became a sales consultant for Arbonne International, a multi-level marketing firm that makes beauty and nutrition products.
Stepping into the land of the Trump resistance, Seema Verma flatly rejected California’s pursuit of single-payer health care as unworkable and dismissed the Affordable Care Act as too flawed to ever succeed.
Premiums in California’s health insurance exchange will rise by an average of 8.7% next year, marking a return to more modest increases despite ongoing threats to the Affordable Care Act.
More than one-third of California's $200 billion budget goes toward health care. Private health insurance spending in the state, meanwhile, exceeds more than $100 billion a year.
The Trump administration has been pushing for the return of short-term health plans and association health plans, two types of coverage that are exempt from Affordable Care Act requirements and could offer an affordable alternative to consumers who feel priced out of the Obamacare marketplace. But some California advocates say these plans offer shoddy coverage and pose a threat to the stability of the healthcare system.
A handful of the world’s biggest drugmakers are canceling or reducing planned price increases in the U.S., following a new California drug pricing transparency law and continued political pressure over pharmaceutical costs.