Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Mid-week update

Congress started its lame duck session today. Federal News Radio's article helpfully reviews the list of tasks for the lame duck session which of course leads with addressing the continuing resolution funding the federal government which expires on December 11.  In the lame duck session following the Democrat's takeover of Congress following the 2006 election, Congress did enact a healthcare law which improved the rules for high deductible health plans with health savings accounts. The FEHBlog thought that in view of the Supreme Court's decision to hear the ACA subsidy case and this recent precedent, Congress would take a crack at fixing this issue pending before the high court and other problems created by the ACA in the lame duck session. We'll see but the FEHBlog no longer is holding his breath. This type of legislative activity may occur in the next session of Congress.

On Monday, AHIP released information on the value of provider networks which carriers can share with Plan members.

Finally, Fierce Healthcare offers four reasons to be optimistic about the U.S. healthcare system.

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