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New Health Care Bills Proposed in Senate and House

April 22, 2008
A number of health care bills that will work to regulate the health care industry have passed out of the Assembly and the Senate’s health policy committees. Of particular interest to artists is Senate Bill 1522 (Senator Darrell Steinberg, Sacramento), which would regulate the individual insurance market. Artists often have episodic employment and must thus buy their insurance on the individual market, where there is a confusing array of plans that are hard to compare, while the quality of the insurance is not guaranteed. SB 1522 would categorize all health plans offered on the individual market by creating five tiers of coverage with different standards that would need to be met in each tier; in this manner, individual consumers would be able to compare health plans better, which would also encourage direct competition between insurance providers based on price and quality. The bill would also set a minimum standard for coverage giving consumers a better sense of security about their coverage; the bill states that the lowest tier plans would cover physician visits, hospitalization, and preventive care. Artists United for Healthcare also supported this bill when it was reviewed by the Senate on Wednesday, April 9th.

In addition, there are several other bills that have been working through the Assembly and Senate that would work to regulate the health care industry. One of these, Senate Bill 1440 (Senator Shelia Kuehl), would require insurers to devote at least 85% of what consumers pay to patient care, rather than administration, marketing, and profit; SB 1440 passed the Senate health committee on April 9th as well. Two other bills that passed the Assembly Health Committee on Tuesday, April 8th, would regulate the insurer practice of retroactively canceling policies after patients become sick and require expensive treatments. One, Assembly Bill 1945 (Assemblyman Hector De La Torre) would create an independent panel to review cases where an insurance company wishes to rescind a policy; the bill passed on a bipartisan vote 11-0. Another, Assembly Bill 2549 (Assemblywoman Mary Hayashi) would limit the time period health plans have to cancel coverage because of a fraudulent application to six months after the application is approved; this bill passed along part lines. Another important bill that passed the Assembly Health Committee on Tuesday, Assembly Bill 2967 (Assemblywoman Sally Leiber) would require medical providers to publicly disclose price and safety information.

In the aftermath of AB X1 1 not passing the Senate, legislators are working to regulate the health care industry to improve the health insurance industry from the inside out; the bills that are being put forth are setting a standard for coverage while also setting a foundation for further steps in the years to come. There are several other pending bills relating to health, a list of which can be found here. Legislation needed to pass policy committees by April 18th in order to continue to advance through the legislative process.