Category Archives: Health care

Has Obamacare already been repealed?

By Steve Brawner, © 2018 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Remember last year when congressional Republicans failed to repeal Obamacare after talking about doing so for years? It turns out they may have succeeded, fully or partly, by acting indirectly.

In December, Congress passed the Tax Cut and Jobs Act, which all six members of Arkansas’ congressional delegation supported. The legislation ended Obamacare’s penalty for failing to comply with the individual mandate to buy health insurance. The penalty goes away at the end of this year.

To understand why that’s important, you have to look back to 2012, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – was constitutional in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius. The court ruled that Congress could not compel individuals to purchase insurance. However, it said the mandate’s penalty was a “tax,” which Congress can enact. Chief Justice John Roberts, appointed by President George W. Bush, wrote that opinion. That’s how the individual mandate survived.

Now that there’s no tax, a Texas-led coalition of 20 states, including Arkansas under Attorney General Leslie Rutledge, is suing the federal government in hopes of having the entire law declared unconstitutional. The lawsuit says that without the individual mandate, the law is now “an irrational regulatory regime governing an essential market.”  Continue reading →

Opioid lawsuits: What to do with the millions/billions?

State and local governments in Arkansas are suing opioid manufacturers for millions or billions. If they’re successful, what will they do with all that money?

On March 21, the Association of Arkansas Counties and the Arkansas Municipal League announced that 72 counties – it’s now all 75 – and 210 cities together were suing 65 defendants in the opioid industry in Crittenden County Circuit Court. Both organizations were already part of a nationwide federal lawsuit. Then on March 29 Attorney General Leslie Rutledge announced her office is suing three of the largest opioid manufacturers.

They’re currently feuding a bit over these dueling lawsuits, but that’s not what this column’s about.

Continue reading →

Medical marijuana: Skip the growers?

By Steve Brawner

© 2018 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

It’s been 18 months since Arkansas voters passed the medical marijuana amendment, and the drug is still not available – legally under state law, anyway. It may not be available for a while, now that a judge has put a halt to awarding growers’ licenses.

But there could be a way to change that. First, the Medical Marijuana Commission could follow the governor’s advice and award growers’ and dispensaries’ licenses the same way alcohol permits are awarded – through a lottery. Meanwhile, the amendment’s sponsor says growers aren’t really needed yet anyway because dispensaries can meet current demand. Continue reading →

Trump change helps Arkansas Obamacare program continue

Seema Verna

Seema Verna hands the work requirement waiver to Gov. Asa Hutchinson at the Capitol.

The presidential administration that tried to repeal Obamacare in 2017 just made it easier for some Arkansas legislators to vote to continue part of it.

I guess that’s ironic. But that’s how politics works sometimes.

On Monday, Arkansas was visited by Seema Verna, President Trump’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator. She granted a waiver letting the state require some Arkansas Works beneficiaries to work.  Continue reading →

Your pharmacist doesn’t want to see you now

If your pharmacist doesn’t look happy to see you the next time you visit, it’s probably because she’s losing money filling your prescription.

The problems are occurring with two groups of patients. The largest are those covered by Arkansas Works, which uses Medicaid dollars to purchase private health insurance for 285,000 low-income Arkansans. The other problem patients are the 68,100 Arkansans who purchase their health insurance through the online Arkansas Health Insurance Marketplace. Like Arkansas Works, the Marketplace was created by the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare.

Who are the pharmacy benefit managers?

Pharmacists say that, in those plans, they aren’t being fairly reimbursed by their pharmacy benefit managers. Those PBMs act as middlemen between pharmacists and insurance companies, which in Arkansas are Blue Cross, Ambetter and QualChoice. Continue reading →