MEDIA BACKGROUND: 6 Health Care Concerns in the Senate HHS Omnibus Bill

Contact: Kenza Hadj-Moussa, 612-386-95556

MEDIA BACKGROUND

6 Health Care Concerns in the Senate HHS Omnibus Bill

St. Paul–Our government is responsible for making health care work for everyone. Minnesotans are desperate for real, long-term  improvements that expand public health care and rein in health care costs. We have heard many times this year that the Senate’s reinsurance proposal is a Band-Aid on the way to a bigger solution, but this bill does not reflect that understanding. 

Here are 6 Health Care Concerns in the Senate’s HHS Omnibus Bill (SF2452 DE):

1. Ends the health care provider tax.  Instead of creating more security for middle income Minnesotans in the broken individual market, this bill reduces security for low income Minnesotans by not renewing the health care provider tax.
2. Cuts coverage and increases cost sharing for ‘savings.’ It alludes to cutting vision and dental benefits from Minnesotans on public programs, including many in poverty (Art. 2, Sect. 8 and 13) for ‘cost savings’—and significantly increases health care costs for people enrolled in MinnesotaCare (Art. 2 Sec 12).
3. Undermines our government’s ability to check the private market. It ties the state’s hands from making future improvements to the choices available to Minnesotans in the individual market, taking away MNsure’s active purchaser power. (Art. 4, Sec. 2).
4. Blocks a public option. The bill blocks the state from creating a public option by like the ONECare buy-in by barring DHS from bearing risk (Art. 4, Sec. 3).
5. Leaves the door open for a health care heist. This bill and the state Senate have taken no responsibility for the ticking time bomb set in 2017 when Minnesota laws were removed that had prohibited for-profit health plans. Unlike the House, there are no protections in place to keep billions of dollars in public health care assets from private hands – this is our money.
6. Allows nonprofit health insurance companies to take our money for profit. Until 2017, state law required that nonprofit health insurance company’s assets go toward health care. Unlike the House, the Senate Majority does not reinstate the requirement that nonprofit health plans use their assets for care. When this law was repealed in 2017, Medica started transferring tens of millions of dollars to Wisconsin. This violates our values, especially when health plans have public contracts. Too many Minnesotans are suffering because of health care costs. That’s our money and it should go to care.

More background on #5 and #6: State law significantly changed in 2017 regarding nonprofit and for profit health insurance companies. The consequences of this have already begun. One non-profit HMO, Medica, has moved $175 million to out of state and for-profit subsidiaries, and there may have been more transfers we don’t know about. United Health Group (UHG) has obtained an HMO license in Minnesota, enabling them to bid on state programs (public money). [1]

Just this spring, a judge ruled that a UHG subsidiary had “breached its fiduciary duty” by adopting coverage guidelines that were “fundamentally flawed” and “tainted by financial interests”[2], and the Star Tribune reported that UHG was being investigated by the U.S. House for selling short-term “junk” policies that “discriminate against individuals with pre-existing conditions and put consumers at significant financial risk.”

By continuing to allow for-profits, not reinstating the requirements for non-profits to use their earnings for care, and not proposing any conversion regulations, this bill would allow billions in public health care assets to be removed from the public trust should our existing non-profit HMOs be purchased by UHG, for example, or convert to for-profit in other ways.

###

TakeAction Minnesota is a statewide,  independent,  multiracial people’s organization working to advance democracy and equity through organizing, political action, and campaigns. The organization has offices in St. Paul, Duluth, and St. Cloud. 

www.takeactionminnesota.org 

[1] http://www.startribune.com/unitedhealthcare-gets-hmo-license-in-minnesota/506127572/

[2]http://www.startribune.com/judge-calls-unitedhealth-coverage-guidelines-tainted/506790982/, Chris Snowbeck, March 6, 2019