Author Topic: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare  (Read 1275 times)

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Offline Rapunzel

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Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« on: February 12, 2014, 12:40:20 am »
http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2014/02/some-hivaids-patients-cant-get-obamacare.html

Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare

There are some HIV/AIDs patients who are on the bubble, they can't afford the high premiums for plans through the exchanges, they aren't poor enough to be eligible for the federal funds. Before Obamacare, the 1990 Ryan White Act offered people with HIV/AIDS federal financial help in paying for AIDS drugs and health insurance premiums, especially in state-run, high-risk pools. Those pools no longer exist but the Obamacare participant companies won't take the "Ryan White funds," and it's all the federal government's funds.

   
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Some healthcare advocates see discrimination in the move, but Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana says it is not trying to keep people with HIV/AIDS from enrolling in one of its policies under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.

    The state's largest carrier is rejecting checks from a federal program designed to help these patients pay for AIDS drugs and insurance premiums, and has begun notifying customers that their enrollment in its Obamacare plans will be discontinued.

    The carrier says it no longer will accept third-party payments, such as those under the 1990 Ryan White Act, which many people with HIV/AIDS use to pay their premiums.

    "In no event will coverage be provided to any subscribers, as of March 1, 2014, unless the premiums are paid by the subscriber (or a relative) unless otherwise required by law," Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana spokesman John Maginnis told Reuters.

According to Blue Cross they are complying with statements from Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).

   
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In September, CMS informed insurers that Ryan White funds "may be used to cover the cost of private health insurance premiums, deductibles, and co-payments" for Obamacare plans.

    In November, however, it warned "hospitals, other healthcare providers, and other commercial entities" that it has "significant concerns" about their supporting premium payments and helping Obamacare consumers pay deductibles and other costs, citing the risk of fraud.

    The insurers told healthcare advocates that the November guidance requires them to reject payments from the Ryan White program in order to combat fraud, said Robert Greenwald, managing director of the Legal Services Center of Harvard Law School, a position Louisiana Blue still maintains.

    "As an anti-fraud measure, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana has implemented a policy, across our individual health insurance market, of not accepting premium payments from any third parties who are not related" to the subscriber, Maginnis said.

    On Friday, CMS spokeswoman Tasha Bradley told Reuters that, to the contrary, Ryan White grantees "may use funds to pay for premiums on behalf of eligible enrollees in Marketplace plans, when it is cost-effective for the Ryan White program," meaning that having people with HIV/AIDS enroll in insurance under Obamacare could save the government money.

    "The third-party payer guidance CMS released (in November) does not apply to" Ryan White programs.
Apparently no one told the insurance companies.

   
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Hundreds of indigent HIV/AIDS patients are dependent on Ryan White payments for Obamacare because they fall into a gap. They are not eligible for Medicaid, the joint federal-state health insurance program for the poor, because Louisiana did not expand the low-income program, and Obamacare federal subsidies don't kick in until people are at 100 percent of the federal poverty level.

    Starting on October 1, AIDS advocates and others in Louisiana "were enrolling anyone and everyone we could" through the Obamacare exchange, said Lucy Cordts of the New Orleans NO/AIDS Task Force.

    Last month, her clients and those of other AIDS groups began to hear from Louisiana Blue that their enrollments were in limbo because the company would not accept the Ryan White checks for premium payments.

    The only other carrier that is refusing to accept such payments is Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota, according to a CMS official.

    North Dakota Blue "restricts premium payment from third parties including employers, providers, and state agencies," said spokeswoman Andrea Dinneen, but "is currently reviewing its eligibility policies with respect to recipients of Ryan White Program funding."

Eventually, this problem will be worked out, it's just another example, like the screwed up website, and the people losing their plans, of how this President's rush to shove Obamacare down our throats and get it started is hurting various Americans

H/T The Corner
�The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves.� G Washington July 2, 1776

Oceander

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #1 on: February 12, 2014, 02:00:05 am »
Since almost all of the affected people most likely voted (at least once) for Obama, I'm afraid I can't muster that much sympathy.

Offline Atomic Cow

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #2 on: February 12, 2014, 02:11:14 am »
Since almost all of the affected people most likely voted (at least once) for Obama, I'm afraid I can't muster that much sympathy.

Ditto.
"...And these atomic bombs which science burst upon the world that night were strange, even to the men who used them."  H. G. Wells, The World Set Free, 1914

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #3 on: February 12, 2014, 02:27:32 am »
Of course I don't wish anyone to be ill, especially with AIDs, but I have to agree.
Liberals idiots and fools reap what they sow.
 
It's FREE! FREE! Everything is FREE! Thank you oh Lord, my Lord, Obama...
 
Fools. Everyone of them.
You cannot "COEXIST" with people who want to kill you.
If they kill their own with no conscience, there is nothing to stop them from killing you.
Rational fear and anger at vicious murderous Islamic terrorists is the same as irrational antisemitism, according to the Leftists.

Offline Rapunzel

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #4 on: February 12, 2014, 02:31:33 am »
Not everyone with HIV/AIDS is homosexual.  It's estimated 32% are heterosexual and have never had a homosexual experience and, sadly, some of the most innocent victims are babies...
�The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves.� G Washington July 2, 1776

Oceander

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #5 on: February 12, 2014, 02:47:35 am »
Not everyone with HIV/AIDS is homosexual.  It's estimated 32% are heterosexual and have never had a homosexual experience and, sadly, some of the most innocent victims are babies...

Who said anything about homosexual vs heterosexual, other than you?

Offline Rapunzel

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #6 on: February 12, 2014, 02:55:11 am »
Who said anything about homosexual vs heterosexual, other than you?

or that everyone with AIDS automatically voted for Obama - or so you intimated in your first reply to this thread.
�The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves.� G Washington July 2, 1776

Oceander

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #7 on: February 12, 2014, 03:02:42 am »
or that everyone with AIDS automatically voted for Obama - or so you intimated in your first reply to this thread.

Ooh!  You're really telling me off now, aren't you?  I'm not sure if I can take any more of this scolding.

Offline Rapunzel

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #8 on: February 12, 2014, 03:05:11 am »
Ooh!  You're really telling me off now, aren't you?  I'm not sure if I can take any more of this scolding.

You're the one who wrote the following:
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Since almost all of the affected people most likely voted (at least once) for Obama, I'm afraid I can't muster that much sympathy.

Sorry I DO have sympathy for the many babies suffering here and in places like Africa from this disease and don't think it is a matter to made light of.
�The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves.� G Washington July 2, 1776

Oceander

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #9 on: February 12, 2014, 03:07:09 am »
You're the one who wrote the following:
Sorry I DO have sympathy for the many babies suffering here and in places like Africa from this disease and don't think it is a matter to made light of.

I could ...

but I shouldn't...

so I won't.

Offline Rapunzel

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Re: Some HIV/AIDS Patients Can't Get Obamacare
« Reply #10 on: February 12, 2014, 04:33:36 am »
BTW they are having no problems signing up under Covered California - which has signed doctors up on the plan without first consulting said doctors if they want to be part of CC.
�The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves.� G Washington July 2, 1776