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.
A class-action lawsuit filed earlier this month claims that Blue Shield of California stiffed consumers on more than $34 million dollars in refunds on premiums they paid in 2014.
On the heels of healthcare reform, 2016 be-gan with the expansion of the small-group employer category—the bedrock of the U.S. economy.
Health insurance rates through the Covered California insurance exchange will be rising between 8.4 percent and 10.8 percent on average next year in the central San Joaquin Valley, the exchange announced Tuesday.
California’s Obamacare premiums will jump 13.2 percent on average next year, a sharp increase that is likely to reverberate nationwide in an election year.
State legislation to outlaw ransomware is drawing broad support from tech leaders and lawmakers, spurred by an uptick in that type of cybercrime and a series of recent attacks on hospitals in Southern California.
Provider directories for some health plans sold through Covered California and in the private market are so inaccurate that they create an “awful” situation for consumers trying to find doctors, according to the lead author of a new study published in the journal Health Affairs.
With Californians facing the busiest ballot in more than a decade, big spenders are poised to make it one of the most expensive election battles in state history -- already contributing $185 million to fight over everything from sex, drugs and guns to tobacco and taxes.
A federal appeals court has ruled that consumers must be allowed to buy certain types of health insurance that do not meet the stringent standards of the Affordable Care Act, deciding that the administration had gone beyond the terms of federal law.
The latest study of medicine prices finds U.S. insurers' spending on expensive prescription drugs nearly quadrupled from 2003 through 2014, when the number of such prescriptions filled tripled.
A state ballot initiative meant to lower prescription drug prices for California faces an expected opponent: the pharmaceutical industry, which has spent almost $70 million to defeat it.