If the Reasonably priced Care Act had been terminated, “that may imply over 100 million People will lose protections for preexisting circumstances.”
President Joe Biden in a marketing campaign commercial, Might 8
President Joe Biden’s reelection marketing campaign needs voters to distinction his report on well being care coverage together with his predecessor’s. In Might, Biden’s marketing campaign started airing a monthlong, $14 million advert marketing campaign focusing on swing-state voters and minority teams with spots on TV, digital, and radio.
Within the advert, titled “Terminate,” Biden assails former President Donald Trump for his previous guarantees to overturn the Reasonably priced Care Act, also called Obamacare. Biden additionally warns of the potential impact if Trump is returned to workplace and once more pursues repeal.
“That will imply over 100 million People will lose protections for preexisting circumstances,” Biden mentioned within the advert.
Lower than six months from Election Day, polls show Trump narrowly main Biden in a head-to-head race in most swing states. And voters belief Trump to raised deal with points corresponding to inflation, crime, and the financial system by vital margins.
An ABC News/Ipsos poll of about 2,200 adults, launched in early Might, exhibits the one main coverage points on which Biden obtained greater marks than Trump had been well being care and abortion entry. It’s no shock, then, that the marketing campaign is making those topics central to Biden’s pitch to voters.
As such, we dug into the information surrounding Biden’s declare.
Preexisting Situation Calculations
The concept 100 million People live with a number of preexisting circumstances will not be new. It was the topic of a back-and-forth between then-candidate Biden and then-President Trump throughout their earlier race, in 2020. After Biden cited that statistic in a presidential debate, Trump responded, “There aren’t 100 million individuals with preexisting circumstances.”
A KFF Well being Information/PolitiFact HealthCheck on the time rated Biden’s declare to be “principally true,” discovering a reasonably large vary of estimates — from 54 million to 135 million — of the variety of People with preexisting circumstances. Estimates on the decrease finish have a tendency to contemplate “preexisting circumstances” to be extra extreme persistent circumstances corresponding to most cancers or cystic fibrosis. Estimates on the spectrum’s greater finish embrace individuals with extra widespread well being issues corresponding to bronchial asthma and weight problems, and behavioral well being problems corresponding to substance use dysfunction or despair.
Biden’s Might advert focuses on how many individuals could be weak if protections for individuals with preexisting circumstances had been misplaced. It is a matter of some debate. To know it, we have to break down the protections put in place by the ACA, and those who exist individually.
Earlier than and After
Earlier than the ACA’s preexisting situation protections took impact in 2014, insurers in the individual market — individuals shopping for protection for themselves or their households — may cost greater premiums to individuals with specific circumstances, prohibit protection of particular procedures or medicines, set annual and lifelong protection limits on advantages, or deny individuals protection.
“There have been quite a few practices utilized by insurance coverage corporations to primarily defend themselves from the prices related to individuals who have preexisting circumstances,” mentioned Sabrina Corlette, a co-director of the Heart on Well being Insurance coverage Reforms at Georgetown College and an knowledgeable on the medical insurance market.
Insurers offering protection to giant employers may impose lengthy ready durations earlier than staff’ advantages kicked in. And although employer-sponsored plans couldn’t discriminate in opposition to particular person staff based mostly on their well being circumstances, small-group plans for companies with fewer than 50 staff may increase prices throughout the board if giant numbers of staff in a given firm had such circumstances. That might immediate some employers to cease providing protection.
“The insurer would say, ‘Effectively, as a result of you will have three individuals with most cancers, we’re going to increase your premium dramatically,’ and subsequently make it exhausting for the small employer to proceed to supply protection to its staff as a result of the protection is just unaffordable,” recalled Edwin Park, a analysis professor at Georgetown College’s McCourt Faculty of Public Coverage who researches public medical insurance markets.
Because of this, many individuals with preexisting circumstances skilled what some researchers dubbed “job lock.” Individuals felt trapped of their jobs as a result of they feared they wouldn’t be capable of get medical insurance wherever else.
Some fundamental preexisting situation protections exist impartial of the ACA. The 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, for instance, restricted how insurers may restrict protection and mandated that employer-sponsored group plans can’t refuse to cowl somebody due to a well being situation. Medicare and Medicaid equally can’t deny protection based mostly on well being background, although age and income-based eligibility necessities imply many People don’t qualify for that protection.
As soon as the ACA’s preexisting situation protections kicked in, plans bought on the person market had to offer a complete bundle of advantages to all purchasers, regardless of their well being standing.
Nonetheless, some conservatives say Biden’s declare overstates how many individuals are affected by Obamacare protections.
Even if you happen to think about the broadest definition of the variety of People dwelling with such circumstances, “there’s zero manner you would justify that 100 million individuals would lose protection” with out ACA protections, mentioned Theo Merkel, who was a Trump administration well being coverage adviser and is now a senior analysis fellow with the Paragon Well being Institute and a senior fellow on the Manhattan Institute for Coverage Analysis, a conservative suppose tank.
Joseph Antos, a senior fellow on the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative suppose tank, referred to as the advert’s preexisting circumstances declare “the standard bluster.” To achieve 100 million individuals affected, he mentioned, “it’s a must to assume that numerous individuals would lose protection.” And that’s unlikely to occur, he mentioned.
That’s as a result of most individuals — about 55% of People, in line with the latest government data — obtain medical insurance by way of their employers. As such, they’re protected by the Well being Insurance coverage Portability and Accountability Act guidelines, and their plans probably wouldn’t change, at the least within the quick time period, if the ACA went away.
Antos mentioned main insurance coverage corporations, which have operated beneath the ACA for greater than a decade, would probably keep the established order even with out such protections. “The damaging publicity could be wonderful,” he mentioned.
Individuals who lose their jobs, he mentioned, could be weak.
However Corlette argued that dropping ACA protections may result in People being priced out of their plans, as well being insurers once more start medical underwriting within the particular person market.
Park predicted that many companies may additionally progressively discover themselves priced out of their insurance policies.
“For these corporations with older, much less wholesome staff than different small employers, they’d see their premiums rise,” he instructed KFF Well being Information.
Furthermore, Park mentioned, anytime individuals misplaced work or switched jobs, they’d threat dropping their insurance coverage, reverting to the previous days of job lock.
“In any given yr, the quantity [of people affected] might be a lot smaller than the 100 million, however all of these 100 million could be prone to being discriminated in opposition to due to their preexisting situation,” Park mentioned.
Our Ruling
We beforehand dominated Biden’s declare that 100 million People have preexisting circumstances as in the ballpark, and nothing means that’s modified. Relying on the definition, the quantity may very well be smaller, however it additionally may very well be even larger and is more likely to have elevated since 2014.
Although Biden’s declare concerning the quantity of people that could be affected if these protections went away appears correct, it’s unclear how a return to the pre-ACA scenario would manifest.
On the marketing campaign path this yr, Trump has promised — as he did many occasions previously — to replace the health law with one thing higher. However he’s by no means produced a substitute plan. Biden’s declare shouldn’t be judged based mostly on his lack of specificity.
We charge Biden’s declare Principally True.
our sources
ABC Information/Ipsos Ballot, “Six Months Out, a Tight Presidential Race With a Battle Between Issues & Attributes,” Might 5, 2024
Avalere, “Repeal of ACA’s Pre-Existing Condition Protections Could Affect Health Security of Over 100 Million People,” Oct. 23, 2018
Biden-Harris 2024 marketing campaign electronic mail, “NEW AD: Biden-Harris 2024 Launches ‘Terminate’ Slamming Trump for Assaults on Well being Care,” Might 8, 2024
Heart for American Progress, “Number of Americans With Preexisting Conditions by District for the 116th Congress,” Oct. 2, 2019
Census Bureau, “Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2022,” September 2023
CNN, “Trump Administration Gives States New Power to Weaken Obamacare,” Oct. 22, 2018
Division of Well being and Human Companies, “Health Insurance Coverage for Americans with Pre-Existing Conditions: The Impact of the Affordable Care Act,” Jan. 5, 2017
Division of Well being and Human Companies, “The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 Helpful Tips,” accessed Might 15, 2024
E mail exchanges with Biden-Harris 2024 marketing campaign official, Might 13-15, 2024
E mail change with Karoline Leavitt, Trump 2024 marketing campaign nationwide press secretary, Might 13, 2024
KFF, “KFF Health Tracking Poll: The Public’s Views on the ACA,” Might 15, 2024
KFF, “Recent Trends in Mental Health and Substance Use Concerns Among Adolescents,” Feb. 6, 2024
KFF Well being Information, “Drowning in a ‘High-Risk Insurance Pool’ — At $18,000 a Year,” Feb. 27, 2017
KFF Well being Information and PolitiFact, “Biden’s in the Ballpark on How Many People Have Preexisting Conditions,” Oct. 1, 2020
The New York Instances, “Trump Leads in 5 Key States, as Young and Nonwhite Voters Express Discontent With Biden,” Might 13, 2024
Telephone interview and electronic mail exchanges with Theo Merkel, a senior fellow on the Manhattan Institute and the director of the Personal Well being Reform Initiative on the Paragon Well being Institute, Might 14-15, 2024
Telephone interview with Edwin Park, a analysis professor at Georgetown College’s McCourt Faculty of Public Coverage, Might 22, 2024
Telephone interview with Sabrina Corlette, a co-director of the Heart on Well being Insurance coverage Reforms at Georgetown College, Might 14, 2024
Truthsocial.com, post by @realDonaldTrump, Nov. 25, 2023
The Wall Road Journal, “Healthcare.gov to Shut Down During Parts of Enrollment Period for Maintenance,” Sept. 23, 2017
Work, Growing old and Retirement, “Job Lock, Work, and Psychological Well-Being in the United States,” Feb. 19, 2016
YouTube.com/@CSPAN, “First 2020 Presidential Debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden,” Sept. 29, 2020
YouTube.com/@JoeBiden, “Terminate” marketing campaign commercial, Might 10, 2024
Telephone interview with Joseph Antos, a senior fellow on the American Enterprise Institute, June 5, 2024
Well being Affairs, What It Means To Cover Preexisting Conditions, Sept. 11, 2020
KFF, Pre-Existing Conditions and Medical Underwriting in the Individual Insurance Market Prior to the ACA, Dec. 12, 2016
PolitiFact, “Does Trump Want To Repeal the ACA, as Biden Says? Tracking His Changing Stance Over the Years,” June 3, 2024
