Richmond, Virginia—Today, Cardinal News released a sobering look at how the health care landscape is poised to change for middle-income Virginians under the recently passed federal budget bill. Residents should be braced for significant rate increases to plans available through the Affordable Care Act marketplace, office and hospital closures, loss of access to Medicaid plans, and rising costs even for people who have private insurance.
“This crisis is unacceptable, and it could have been avoided if our elected officials had any backbone,” said LaTwyla Mathias, Executive Director of Progress Virginia. “Middle-income families are being priced out of basic health care coverage while our elected leaders in Congress allow critical support to expire without a fight. The effect of these ballooning premiums and disappearing care options isn’t abstract: this affects real people, real families who are being forced to choose between rising rent, rising costs, and being able to get care when they get sick. We need bold, immediate action to restore the Affordable Care Act tax credits and protect our communities from being pushed off the edge. People in our community deserve better than broken promises and budget cuts. They deserve access to affordable, high-quality health care, no matter their income or zip code.”
Some of the alarming highlights from the Cardinal piece are below:
- “Keven Patchett, director of the Virginia Health Benefit Exchange, painted an even more dire picture for the Senate Health and Human Resources Oversight Joint Subcommittee last week. By his estimate, about 100,000 Virginians are expected to fall off of their insurance due to the cost if Congress doesn’t take action. Out-of-pocket premiums could rise in Virginia by 30% to 50% on Jan. 1, he said.”
- Because the Biden-era tax credits to help people pay their health insurance premiums were not renewed in the federal budget bill, premium costs will revert to pre-2021 prices. Prior to 2021, premium costs in Charlottesville, VA were the highest in the entire country for several years in a row.
- Costs for private insurance are also expected to rise; as people are priced out of their ACA plans, many healthier people will drop their plans, the insurance pools will become higher-risk and insurers will raise their rates across the board.
- The state’s 71 free clinics are bracing for an influx of new patients as people lose their health insurance. The clinics, which are mostly at or over capacity already, serve 110,000 Virginians.
- Local access to care will also be affected by rising costs; eight rural hospitals that serve a high proportion of Medicaid clients are already projected to close
Background:
- 400,000 people have used Virginia’s Health Insurance Marketplace to choose and access a health plan since 2023.
- Yesterday, Senator Scott Surovell suggested in a letter to the state insurance commissioner that premiums could rise as much as 75% in some parts of the Commonwealth