USA Today - 05.11.2019

8A z TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2019z USA TODAY NEWS

Harris receives coveted invite

from powerful Nevada union

LAS VEGAS – Kamala Harris will be

the first Democratic presidential can-

didate next week to hold a town hall

with the powerful casino workers’ Cu-

linary Union in Las Vegas on Friday.

The union’s national affiliate Unite

Here announced the event Monday.

Border Patrol agent shoots,

kills gunman who opened fire

SUNLAND PARK, N.M. – A Border

Patrol agent shot and killed a gunman

who opened fire about a mile from the

border with Mexico, immigration offi-

cials said.

The agent approached a group of

four people early Sunday, and one of

them pulled out a gun and started

shooting, according to a statement

from U.S. Customs and Border Protec-

tion.

Vietnam police arrest 8 more in

Britain human smuggling deaths

HANOI, Vietnam – Police in Viet-

nam arrested eight more suspects in

connection with the deaths of 39 Viet-

namese nationals found dead inside a

refrigerated truck container in south-

eastern England.

Police said the eight were arrested

Sunday on charges of organizing peo-

ple smuggling overseas as the sprawl-

ing international investigation into

what appears to be a people-smug-

gling tragedy continues. They did not

give any details on the arrested sus-

pects.

Ukraine postpones second stage

of weapons pullback in east

MOSCOW – Ukraine’s military

postponed a second stage of a weap-

ons pullback in the country’s conflict-

ridden east, drawing criticism from

the Kremlin’s envoy to a group trying

to help end the fighting.

The military said the pullback near

the town of Petrovske, which was ten-

tatively set for Monday, could not be

conducted because of recent cease-

fire violations.

From staff and wire reports

IN BRIEF

said, noting she focuses on cost and
whether her medications and checkups
are covered.
Rinehart’s case illustrates one reason
why the star ratings are unlikely to play
a big role in people’s decision-making
for the first year of the national rollout.
Nearly a third of health plans on the fed-
eral exchanges don’t yet have a quality
rating – including all the plans in Iowa,
Kansas and Nebraska. Only one insurer
is available in nearly a quarter of
countiesacross the U.S. And consumers
may not find the information behind the
star ratings valuable without additional
details, insurance experts say.
Across Missouri, Cigna is the only
one of seven insurers to get ratings. The
others have not yet been in the market-
place for the three years needed to merit
a score.
Missouri is one of eight states that
don’t have any health plans that earned
at least three stars. The others are Iowa,
Kansas, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexi-
co, West Virginia and Wyoming. States
with the most three-star or higher
health plans are New York (12), Michi-
gan (10), Pennsylvania (9), Massachu-
setts (8) and California (7).

A new way to judge health plans

The star ratings are largely new to the
federal exchanges, which operate in 39
states. About 80% of plans in the federal
marketplaces earned three or more
stars overall, CMS said. Only 1% earned
five stars.
The new federal star ratings are based
on three main areas: evaluations of the
plans’ administration, such as customer
service; clinical measures that include
how often the plans provide preventive
screenings; and surveys of members’ per-
ception of their plan and its doctors.
Ratings can be viewed at
healthcare.gov, where consumers review
plans’ benefits and prices. Open enroll-
ment runs from Friday through Dec. 15 for
the federal exchange states, though en-
rollment lasts longer in the District of Co-
lumbia and most of the 11 states that oper-
ate their own marketplaces.
Last year, about 11.4 million people
bought coverage on all the exchanges,
with more than 80% getting federal sub-

sidies to lower their premiums.

The good news for consumers is pre-

mium prices on the federal exchanges

are dropping by about 4% on average for

2020.

And consumers generally will have a

wider array of choices as more companies

enter the markets. Nationally, the average

number of health plan choices per cus-

tomer has risen from 26 to 38, according

to Joshua Peck, co-founder of Get Amer-

ica Covered, a nonprofit that helps people

enroll and find coverage. Missouri, for ex-

ample, will have 28 plans from its seven

insurers, he said, up from 14 this past year.

Will consumers use the ratings?

Jodi Ray, who runs Florida’s largest pa-

tient navigator program as director of

Florida Covering Kids & Familiesat the

University of South Florida, is skeptical

consumers will use the new ratings. In-

stead, she said, they will likely focus first

on whether their doctor is on the plan, if

their medications are covered, the size of

the deductible and the monthly costs.

“The star ratings may fall out the door

at that point,” she said.

Many of the states that operate their

own exchanges have already offered qual-

ity ratings, which were required under the

ACA. California’s insurance exchange has

been providing quality ratings for sever-

al years, though it’s unclear how much

weight consumers give them.

“They have a limited effect on con-

sumers but have a significant effect on

health plans,” said Peter Lee, executive

director of Covered California, the

state’s insurance exchange. “It does tip

health plans to focus on what they can

do to improve care, and I think that is a

positive effect.”

Kaiser Permanente (which is not af-

filiated with Kaiser Health News) is the

only insurer in the California exchange

to garner the maximum five stars, Lee

said. It also has the most enrollment of

any plan in the state’s exchange. But, he

noted, the plan has a lower share of the

enrollment in Southern California partly

because its prices are higher compared

with rival insurers, indicating low cost

may trump high rankings in attracting

enrollees.

“It’s good news that nationally the

federal marketplace is putting quality

data out there for consumers,” Lee said.

Still, he added, customers would want to

see the specific criteria that matter to

them, such as how well plans care for

patients with diabetes. Currently, that

data is not immediately accessible for

consumers at healthcare.gov.

Consumers tend to stick with their

insurer even when prices and benefits

change, said Katherine Hempstead, a

senior policy adviser at the Robert Wood

Johnson Foundation, the nation’s larg-

est public health philanthropy. “People

think changing health insurance plans

is a huge pain and they don’t know if

things will get better or worse.” But, she

added, “people respond to consumer

ratings and reviews.”

The federal government already

uses star ratings to help consumers

choose a Medicare Advantage plan as

well as compare hospitals. It began

testing the exchange ratings in a hand-

ful of states over the past two years.

Heather Korbulic, executive director

of the Nevada health exchange, worries

the ratings could be steered by a rela-

tively small number of member surveys.

“It’s such a narrow sample,” she said,

noting one plan’s rating was partly

based on just 200 member reviews.

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a non-

profit news service covering health is-

sues. It is an editorially independent

program of the Kaiser Family Founda-

tion that is not affiliated with Kaiser

Permanente.

Ratings

Premium prices on the federal

exchanges are dropping by about 4%

on for 2020.GETTY IMAGES/ISTOCKPHOTO

Continued from Page 1A

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