#MASS HEALTH CONNECTOR DRIVERS#

Last week, Turnbull again said that rising premiums threaten to undo the work of another Massachusetts health care law - the law that Gov. That law, along with encouraging alternative payment and care delivery models focused on preventative care and patient health, sought to limit cost growth by creating an annual benchmark against which the increased spending is measured. Massachusetts in 2012 passed a law aimed at reining in rising health care costs.

At the time, Vertes called the increases 'higher than moderate and quite disappointing,' and Turnbull said they were 'just an enormous testament to the failure of the cost control laws that we've put in place over the last 10 years.' Unsubsidized and APTC plans saw an average premium increase from 2021 to 2022 of 6.9%. Turnbull and Vertes also spoke up during last year's seal of approval vote. Is it going to be at this magnitude? That, I can't speak to.' 'But once that gets trued up, they're still setting pricing for a future period that most definitely is going to be at a higher cost than what it is right now. I know you don't like that, but I mean, most of the health plans are doing rebates because they did overshoot the mark on their premium rates,' she said. 'Current earnings are not necessarily an indicator of what future premium trends and profitability is going to be. 'I find it hard, as someone who looks at the financial statements of the health plans, to figure out, given how much money they're making, why our premiums are going up so much,' Nancy Turnbull, a board member who worked at the state's Division of Insurance before moving to the Harvard School of Public Health, said.īoard member Rina Vertes, a consultant who previously worked at health care and insurance companies, cited a decades-long difference of opinion with Turnbull and pointed out that the premiums that plans will charge next year aren't necessarily related to past financial performance.

#MASS HEALTH CONNECTOR DRIVERS#

Martha Kwasnik, deputy general counsel at the Division of Insurance, said the primary drivers of the increases were increases in provider and pharmacy costs. The weighted average rate change for the individual and small group insurance market is a 6.6% premium hike, Adams said.

The average change for the 140,055 people who get coverage through ConnectorCare silver tier plans is a 4.6% premium increase. Increases among carriers range from a 5.5% jump for Tufts Health Plan, the lowest, to an 11.9% hike for Health New England, the highest. Two dental carriers submitted 12 qualified dental plans for sale on the exchange, and Adams said those plans will see a 0.1% decrease in the premium. The average change to Health Connector premiums from 2022 to 2023 will be a 7.6% increase for the 85,474 members whose medical coverage is unsubsidized or who receive Advance Premium Tax Credits, Samuel Adams, a senior program analyst at the Health Connector, said. While the Health Connector approves the plans that it will offer for sale, the premium rates are filed with and reviewed by the Division of Insurance. The board's vote last Thursday gave a final seal of approval to eight insurance carriers that submitted a total of 45 non-group and 57 small group qualified health plans for coverage starting Jan.

A year after cost increases that board members called 'not sustainable' and 'quite disappointing,' there was no opposition last week as the Massachusetts Health Connector board approved plan offerings for 2023 that will lead some consumers who buy their health insurance through the exchange to pay an average of 7.6% more.

Mass health connector