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.
UnitedHealthcare can’t have its cake and eat it too. That’s the message from the California health insurance marketplace, which turned aside a request from the nation’s largest health insurer to sell statewide on the exchange because it opted not to join when the effort was getting off the ground in 2014.
A total of 9.9 million people have signed up for private health insurance on ObamaCare's state and federal exchanges, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell told senators Wednesday.
Covered California officials have announced that nearly 300,000 new consumers have signed up for a health plan via the state exchange during its second open enrollment period, the Sacramento Business Journal reports.
Opponents of Proposition 45, a health insurance rate regulation initiative that was overwhelmingly defeated by California voters, spent big in the run-up to the November election.
New regulations requiring California health care insurers to follow stricter guidelines for provider network adequacy, out-of-network notifications and accuracy of provider lists when dealing with the state Department of Insurance went into effect on Monday.
More than 400,000 Medicare beneficiaries who may have been confused or misinformed about the pharmacy details of their 2015 Aetna prescription drug plans have until the end of this month to find participating pharmacies or switch plans, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Insurance giant Anthem Blue Cross leads Obamacare enrollment in California, but Kaiser Permanente is gaining on its archrival.
Of the more than 1 million people who signed up for health care plans through Covered California last year, 92 percent were eligible for enrollment and most of them stayed with their insurance carrier, according to preliminary figures released Wednesday.
California's Medi-Cal program has grown to cover nearly half of the state's children, causing policymakers and child advocates to question the ability of the taxpayer-funded program to adequately serve so many poor kids.
At least 280,000 Sutter Health patients could stop worrying Friday that they'd have to find a new health care provider partway through this year.