washington CBO says 14 million will lose coverage under GOP health bill

Staff/wire report

WASHINGTON

Fourteen million Americans would lose coverage next year under House Republican legislation remaking the nation’s health care system, and that number would balloon to 24 million by 2026, Congress’ budget analysts projected Monday.

Their report deals a stiff blow to a GOP drive already under fire from both parties and large segments of the medical industry.

The Congressional Budget Office report undercuts a central argument President Donald Trump and Republicans have cited for swiftly rolling back the 2010 health care overhaul: that the insurance markets created under that statute are “a disaster” and about to implode. The congressional experts said the market for individual policies “would probably be stable in most areas under either current law or the [GOP] legislation.”

The report also flies in the face of Trump’s talk of “insurance for everybody,” which he stated in January. He has since embraced a less expansive goal – to “increase access” – advanced by House Speaker Paul Ryan and other Republicans.

U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Howland, D-13th, reacted: “This nonpartisan report proves that Trumpcare will rip health care away from 24 million Americans and leave 52 million without any insurance. This is perhaps the most brazen example yet of President Trump telling voters one thing, and then doing something different.”

Ryan continued: “Voters in my state did not cast their ballots to inflict this harm on millions of their fellow neighbors. ... The No. 1 priority for any national health care policy should be how to cover more people and how to improve the coverage they receive. Trumpcare does neither and is moving us in the wrong direction.”

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, said the report “affirms the fears I’ve heard from Ohioans that this plan will kick millions off their insurance and drive up costs for others, especially older Americans.

“It’s shameful Washington politicians who get taxpayer-funded health care are continuing to force this bill on the American people even after learning it will take away coverage from 14 million Americans by next year.”

Health secretary Tom Price told reporters at the White House the report was “simply wrong” and he disagreed “strenuously,” saying it omitted the impact of additional GOP legislation and regulatory changes the Trump administration plans.

On the plus side for Republicans, the budget office said the GOP measure would reduce federal deficits by $337 billion over the coming decade. That’s largely because it would cut the federal-state Medicaid program for low-income Americans and eliminate subsidies that Obama’s law provides to millions of people who buy coverage.

The report also said that while the legislation would push premiums upward before 2020 by an average of 15 to 20 percent compared to current law, premiums would move lower after that. By 2026, average premiums for individuals would be 10 percent lower than under Obama’s statute, it said.

The GOP bill would obliterate the tax penalties Obama’s law imposes on people who don’t buy coverage, and it would eliminate the federal subsidies reflecting people’s income and premium costs for millions.

It would phase out Obama’s expansion of Medicaid to 11 million additional low earners, cap federal spending for the entire program, repeal taxes the statute imposes and halt federal payments to Planned Parenthood for a year.