After years of negotiations and work, the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has finally given the go-ahead for the state to move to its own marketplace, according to a news release Wednesday..
Georgia Insurance Commissioner John King, who developed the Georgia Access System under Gov. Brian Kemp, was ecstatic about the announcement.
“This milestone is the result of the extraordinary work my office has done over the past three years to move Georgia away from its reliance on the federal government for health insurance,” King said in a news release. “Georgia Access’s approach is innovative: it will be the first state-based Exchange to partner with a private company to encourage consumer enrollment. It demonstrates my office’s commitment to expanding access to affordable, quality health insurance and reducing the number of uninsured Georgians.”
The new state-run marketplace will involve millions of dollars in user fees for each policy, which were previously paid on a federal website but will now be collected by the state of Georgia.
“This is a major milestone in providing Georgians with the coverage they need,” said Kemp, who began work on establishing a state-based insurance exchange shortly after taking office as governor in 2019. In a written statement, he called the effort “common sense” and one of his top priorities.
“A state-based insurance exchange will not only make the enrollment process easier for Georgians, it will also increase insurance choices and enhance our ability to promote quality, affordable health plans.”
of The ACA always offered states the opportunity to set up their own exchanges to operate federally subsidized programs, and more than a dozen states have Conservative states, from Kentucky to Massachusetts to Idaho, have not strengthened Obamacare, but conservative state leaders, like Georgia, have not strengthened Obamacare. Georgia even banned the use of state funds to support the ACA, but in recent years Kemp has overturned that ban, arguing he can take it over.
Georgia will face a tough situation when it comes to ACA enrollment: With federal funds pumped into the marketplace, Georgia has seen record enrollment, with 1.3 million Georgians signing up for ACA plans this year.
Enrollment has surged under President Joe Biden, as his administration restored resources cut under former President Donald Trump, including extended enrollment periods and funding for advertising, outreach, and enrollment assistance. Additionally, during the pandemic, President Biden and Congress enacted expanded subsidies that lowered premiums and copayments for a broad range of enrollees. Enrollees flocked to the insurance exchanges.
Kemp also used state funds to promote the ACA and Georgia Access. Georgia Access is still When you sign up, Information and links to companies that do it.
The question for consumers is what kind of help they will get if they need to talk to an assistant or “navigator” to help them choose the best insurance plan, and whether the state’s website will work as well or better than consumers’ current options.
Not all 1.3 million Georgians are covered by the Affordable Care Act About 550,000 people shopped on healthcare.gov, and about 550,000 people registered on the popular website healthsherpa.com, company officials said.
The advantage of both healthcare.gov and healthsherpa.com is that they automatically calculate federal assistance subsidies, provide shoppers with final premiums, and present plans for which a person is eligible so that shoppers can compare coverage and price. And because they only show plans that offer coverage that meet federal standards, shoppers aren’t sold on a bad plan that doesn’t cover what they need.
HealthSherpa and King’s office did not respond Wednesday to questions about whether HealthSherpa will continue to provide enrollment services in Georgia after the state opens Georgia Access.
One concern patient advocates have about negotiating directly with insurance companies and agents is that they are more likely to show people the plans that will give them more business than the plans that will offer them the best coverage. Some patients have reported being switched to insurance plans that completely upended their coverage and left them thousands of dollars in debt.
Federal laws designed to protect consumers from bad insurance remain in effect, and King’s office has overseen the approval of ACA insurance products in Georgia in the past and will continue to do so.
As of Wednesday evening, GeorgiaAccess.gov The state’s website remained. A similarly named website, GeorgiaAccess.org, directed readers to the website of an insurance company called VIP Health Insurance, operated by Victory Insurance Partners. The owner of the URL registration was kept private.
