Insurance carriers that offer health plans on Maine’s online marketplace are proposing double digit rate increases for 2017.
About 84,000 Mainers bought plans on the marketplace last year. But the news is not necessarily all bad for consumers.
Four carriers: Anthem, Aetna, Harvard Pilgrim and Community Health Options want premium increases that range from about 14 to 22 percent. Mike Gendreau of Community Health Options says the proposed rates are a change for the insurance co-op.
“Over the course of the last three years, our premiums for the most part have been flat,” he says. “We saw about a 0.5 percent increase last year.”
Gendreau says the rate increases are the result of higher than expected claims costs last year. A written statement from Anthem gave the same reason for its rate proposal, as well as the cost of drugs and medical therapies.
Emily Brostek of Consumers for Affordable Health Care says the rate filings are concerning, but it’s important to understand that at this point they’re proposals.
“Our Bureau of Insurance in Maine will review that,” she says. “CMS will review all of the rate increases that are proposed to be over 10 percent.”
And even if premiums do go up in 2017, Brostek says, many consumers will have a buffer.
“Because most people who buy plans on the individual marketplace get a tax credit that’s based on the amount of income they have as a household, and that protects them from these big rate increases,” she says.
That may be of little consolation to consumers who earn too much to qualify for a tax credit and may not be able to afford any premium increases. Brostek says when the 2017 Healthcare Marketplace opens this November, it will be important for consumers to shop around to get the best deal possible.
But that still doesn’t resolve the underlying issue behind these proposed rates, says Wendy Wolf of the Maine Health Access Foundation.
“We still haven’t grappled with the fundamental issue in the health care sector with how we get our hands around containing costs,” she says.
One step toward stemming costs, Wolf says, is for consumers to be active participants in their health care. She says when a provider suggests a test or service, ask about its cost and quality before deciding whether to pursue it.
