One of the nation’s biggest health insurers says it will not return to Ohio’s public insurance exchanges next year, a decision that could open more holes in the Affordable Care Act’s increasingly thin system for helping people buy coverage.
Indianapolis-based Anthem’s decision could leave shoppers in 20 counties without an option for buying individual coverage on the exchange, unless another insurer steps in. The exchanges are the only place where people can use an income-based tax credit to help cover the cost of coverage.
Ohio House Speaker Cliff Rosenberger (R-Clarksville) said, “Today’s announcement symbolizes just the latest way that Obamacare has failed the state of Ohio. As the cost of health care continues to climb, the number of options that Ohioans are left with to receive health care continues to decline.
“Ohio is not alone when it comes to dealing with these challenges, but as the nation’s seventh-largest state, laws that make it difficult for private providers to compete and survive place far too great a burden on the hardworking people of this state.
“As we continue to work at the state level to make health care more accessible and affordable, it is vital that the effort to peel back the onerous regulations that were forced upon the states by this overpriced and overreaching federal healthcare law continue at full throttle.”
