Auchincloss says Medicaid cuts will raise costs for all insurance
U.S. Rep. Jake Auchincloss, D-Newton, held a virtual town hall on Wednesday to discuss a host of issues, from the impact of President Donald Trump’s tariffs to immigration and frozen federal grants.
And what he had to say about health insurance may raise alarms.
“The bad news is there are going to be Medicaid cuts, I think, ultimately—not a guarantee, but there will be some,” Auchincloss said. “I believe those Medicaid cuts will ultimately raise commercial health insurance rates, because people who are unenrolled still consume health care.”
That means when people use the emergency room for non-emergency medical issues because an emergency room must see them even without payment, those costs are subsidized and spread throughout the system and result in higher costs for everyone, including people with employer-based health insurance.
“And my strong sense, from having talked to so many employers throughout the district and municipalities, I will add, is that health insurance costs are probably the biggest squeeze on your budget,” Auchincloss said.
He had some good news regarding health care, though, from an executive order recently signed by the president related to drug pricing.
“Probably the best thing it had in there was much tighter scrutiny on the relationship between pharmacy benefit managers and brokers,” Auchincloss said.
Last year, Auchincloss introduced legislation aimed at cracking down on pharmacy benefit managers and what he calls “self-dealing,” which is when an insurance company requires the drugs with the biggest profit margin only be dispensed by that company’s affiliated pharmacies.
Much of that has been included in the president’s executive order, but the president has left it up to the Department of Health and Human Services, which makes Auchincloss skeptical.
“Given the staff and programming and personnel cuts at HHS, I’m perhaps a little skeptical that there’s any in-built competence to do that work, but it is actually an important step in more transparency and accountability in the drug-pricing supply chain, particularly for pharmacy benefit managers,” he said.
By: Bryan McGonigle
Source: The Newton Beacon