Affordable Care Act

This month’s KFF Health Tracking poll examines public opinion and knowledge of Medicare-for-all and a public option, President Trump’s approval on health care programs and issues, the public’s priorities for Congress, and public opinion on the Affordable Care Act and the Texas v. U.S. court case.

Lowering Drug Costs and Maintaining Pre-existing Condition Protections Top Public’s Health Priorities for Congress With the first votes of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary season approaching, large majorities of Democrats – and most of the public overall – support both of the major approaches primary candidates have put forward to…

Medicaid, the provider of health insurance coverage for about one in five Americans and the largest payer for long-term care services in the community and nursing homes, continues to be a key part of health policy debates at the federal and state level. Key Medicaid issues to watch in 2020 include: Medicaid expansion developments; Section 1115 waiver activity; enrollment and spending trends; benefits, payment and delivery system reforms, and the implications of the 2020 elections.

In an Axios column, Drew Altman explains that the elimination of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate penalty has had little impact on how the ACA’s insurance markets are working, showing that “the marketplaces continue to function, even when ‘severed’ from the mandate penalty,” and undercutting a central argument in the lawsuit seeking to strike down the entire law.

With a questionable outlook for 2020 passage of legislation on prescription drug pricing and surprise medical bills, Drew Altman says the real action to watch in health policy is likely to be in the states.

This issue brief presents ten, high-level key questions regarding current public option proposals supported by both Democratic presidential candidates and Members of Congress.

In this Axios column, Drew Altman takes a long-term view of the recently released federal data on health spending showing that spending for private insurance is rising much faster than for Medicare and Medicaid, and predicts rising pressure in the health care industry as a result. 

66% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents — a majority — favor both a public option and Medicare-for-all. Minorities of those who favor either Medicare-for-all or a public option exclusively favor one proposal over the other.

As the Affordable Care Act’s open enrollment period nears an end in most areas this week, a new KFF analysis finds that 4.7 million currently uninsured people could get a bronze-level plan for 2020 and pay nothing in premiums after factoring in tax credits, though the deductibles would be high.…