Although Governor Rick Perry said Texas won’t expand Medicaid or set up a state insurance exchange to accommodate the Affordable Care Act, the federal government might set up exchanges for states that don’t set up their own. From the Associated Press:
The law envisioned that states would run the new markets, or exchanges, with federal control as a fallback only. But the fallback now looks as if it will become the standard option in about half the states , at least initially.
It would happen through something called the federal exchange, humming along largely under wraps on a tight development schedule overseen by the Health and Human Services Department in Washington.
Exchanges are online markets in which individual consumers and small businesses will shop for health insurance among competing private plans. The Supreme Court’s health care decision left both state exchanges and the federal option in place.
In other Medicaid news, CMS this week announced a new rule that purportedly will help providers save up to $9 billion over 10 years and to eliminate some paperwork. The goal of existing electronic transfer standards, combined with new electronic remittance advice, is to reduce manual administrative tasks.
