Congress’ health care inaction could leave more Californians vulnerable to COVID variants

More than two years into the pandemic, it’s unsettling to imagine a scenario in which hundreds of thousands of Californians are exposed to evasive coronavirus subvariants without access to health care while others experience further financial strain amid record inflation. Yet Congress’ reluctance to extend COVID subsidies could force an estimated 220,000 people in the state to forgo insurance and burden middle-class residents who have benefited from lower premiums.

Federal American Rescue Plan Act funding helped a record 1.8 million Californians who rely on the state’s subsidized insurance exchange, Covered California, to weather the COVID-induced economic downturn by cutting costs about 20%. Roughly 350,000 people have signed up since 2020, cementing California’s insurance marketplace as the country’s most effective at reducing the uninsured rate over the past nine years, Covered California executive director Jessica Altman said in an interview with The Bee’s Editorial Board.

Covered California announced a preliminary average rate increase of 6% for 2023 on Tuesday, introducing the first wave of sticker shock for senior citizens, college students, laborers, small-business owners and others who receive coverage from the exchange created under the Affordable Care Act. But if Congress allows pandemic subsidies to expire, an even greater hike is expected by October, when renewals begin. Premiums could double for nearly 1 million people who make $32,000 or less, and hundreds of thousands of middle-income earners could either lose out entirely on financial help or experience spikes as high as $305 per month.

Among the more than 56,000 Sacramento County residents who receive subsidized coverage, premiums are projected to increase by as much as 113%, forcing them to pay over $1,000 more next year.

Altman said Covered California would need $1.7 billion to keep its rates lower, and with a deadline for insurers to lock in their prices coming next month, the window for federal leaders to act is rapidly closing. While many in Congress may lack the appetite for another wave of government spending, they risk burdening the public with more cost increases that directly affect their health as COVID remains an unrelenting threat. Congress must act swiftly to extend the subsidies and work to find a permanent solution that keeps publicly subsidized health insurance affordable for the 14.5 million Americans who rely on it.

Over the past two years, households that lacked health insurance disproportionately suffered the worst consequences from COVID. That was one dimension of a discernible discrepancy in how Californians experienced the pandemic.

Californians of color and those who were unemployed, underemployed or lower-income faced hospitalization and death at far higher rates than those who had insurance and didn’t have to make dangerous trade-offs to get care. A recent study found that nearly one-third of U.S. deaths could have been avoided under a system of universal health care.

Maintaining higher insurance rates boosts California’s overall health and makes treatment for highly transmissible viral variants more accessible. Pricing more people out of coverage with a new school year looming, no statewide vaccine requirements and local officials hesitant to institute mask mandates endangers all of us.

Federal lawmakers must not retreat to the kind of inaction that needlessly cost so many lives early in the pandemic and will cause greater hardship in already difficult times. California’s congressional delegation must ensure that the federal government acts to protect the health and well-being of the state.

This story was originally published July 20, 2022 at 5:00 AM.