Higher premiums and penalties have made shopping for Obamacare plans more confusing this year. Navigator programs, a resource for consumers, lost about 90% of federal funding across more than two dozen states earlier this year. How’s open enrollment going so far? “Chaotic,” says one remaining ACA navigator.
Melanie Evans
Melanie is a reporter and producer for Tradeoffs. She spent eight years at The Wall Street Journal, where she reported on hospital costs, health care quality and the Covid-19 pandemic. Before the Journal, Melanie covered health policy and business for Modern Healthcare and began her career at the Duluth News Tribune in Minnesota, her home state. Her coverage has won awards from the New York Press Club, Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing and Association of Health Care Journalists. She lives in New York.
Posted inCost of Care
Obamacare Premiums Are About to Soar. How’d We Get Here?
Federal subsidies for Affordable Care Act health plans are set to shrink next year. Many shoppers are expected to be priced out, leaving those who stay with higher premiums. The dynamic that threatens to leave markets with fewer and more expensive options as insurers exit, too. How did we get here?
Posted inInsurance
A Rural Hospital in Kentucky Prepares for Medicaid Losses
Harrison Memorial Hospital in Cynthiana is already taking a hard look at its budget in light of Republican cuts to Medicaid.
Posted inHealth Law
How Two Supreme Court Rulings Affect the ACA, Planned Parenthood and the Future of Preventive Care
Health law expert Katie Keith helps us break down what a pair of big court decisions mean for RFK Jr.’s power and for people’s access to abortion, cancer screening and many other kinds of care.
Posted inPublic Health
Global Health, Research and Trump Dominate Aspen Ideas: Health Conference
Our reporters offer key takeaways from one of the biggest health care events of the year.
Posted inPublic Health
Trump’s Policies Could Undermine the Fight to End America’s HIV Epidemic
The White House is asking Congress to sharply roll back federal spending on HIV prevention, a reversal from President Trump’s first term, when he championed investment to end the epidemic in America within a decade.
Posted inPublic Health
RFK Jr. Just Replaced the Experts Guiding U.S. Vaccines. Now What?
The Health and Human Services chief’s latest action on vaccinations is unprecedented, and quickly drew condemnation from medical groups who said his dismissal of the vaccine advisory committee put public health at risk. Here’s why the members of that committee are so important.
Posted inPublic Health
Fighting Measles and Anti-Vax Views in West Texas
Katherine Wells, the public health director in Lubbock, Texas, describes her fight to stop the largest measles outbreak since 2000 despite a chaotic reorganization of federal health agencies.
Posted inPublic Health
How RFK Jr. is Upending Public Health
Two months on the job, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has plowed forward with mass firings, funding cuts and policy shifts. The most immediate effect is across state and local health agencies, where officials say they see new cracks in safeguards against diseases.
Posted inCost of Care
Patients and Employers Support This GOP Budget Cut. Hospitals Say It’s Too Risky.
Medicare would save billions of dollars changing how it pays for routine medical care. Patients would save, too, but rural hospitals could see financial losses.