The Supreme Court has heard several hours of arguments regarding the Affordable Care Act. Soon, a decision will be made. If the Justices decided to get rid of the entire Affordable Care Act it will negatively impact people who were, until recently, considered to be uninsurable. What will happen to all those people?
Before the Affordable Care Act, people who were considered to have a pre-existing condition were finding it impossible to be approved for health insurance. This is because people who are seriously ill tend to require more doctor’s visits, more prescription medications, and more hospital visits, than do people who are healthy.
It would be harder for an insurance company to make a profit if it has to cover too many people who are seriously ill. As a result, many insurers were refusing to cover people who desperately needed health insurance coverage.
The Affordable Care Act is working on changing this problem. This will happen in two ways. First, health insurance companies will be prohibited from refusing to cover a person who has a pre-existing condition. This will take place in 2014. It is the reason why the individual mandate is so important. If everyone, both sick and healthy, buys health insurance, it will help to balance out the expenses incurred by one seriously ill person. It will help keep insurance premiums rates from skyrocketing.
In the meantime, the Affordable Care Act has already implemented a second solution. It is called the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan, or PCIP. This has allowed many Americans, who were considered to be uninsurable, to find health insurance coverage. However, many found that the cost of the premiums for PCIP were still too expensive for them to afford.
There is the potential that the Supreme Court will decide to get rid of the entire Affordable Care Act. If this happens, it could result in the end of the federal PCIP. What will happen to all those people who have pre-existing conditions then?
Without the Affordable Care Act, and the PCIP, there wouldn’t be anything requiring health insurance companies to accept customers who have a pre-existing condition. This group of people would go right back to being uninsured, and uninsurable, once again. Right now, 35 states have a state pre-existing condition program. The premiums for it would generally be higher than it is for the PCIP, and there could be waiting periods before someone can get health insurance coverage through the state program.
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