Speaking beneath the twinkling crystal chandeliers of the Capitol Hilton ballroom this morning, America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) president Karen Ignagni declared that the insurance industry is still on board with the Democratic health care reform effort, pushing back against the presumption that the two sides have declared war. “Our community was one of the first to position ourselves very actively to a massive overhaul of the insurance market,” Ignagni told the audience members, who were attending the organization’s conference on state insurance issues. She added that AHIP is still pushing for “a massive restructuring of how markets work and a massive change in the way the administrative process works” within insurance companies.
Altogether, Ignagni was trying to present the insurance industry as one of the major visionaries behind health care reform--not one of its obstructionists. This runs counter to the message that’s only growing louder from the Democratic leadership in Congress--not to mention the activist left, who organized a mass demonstration directly outside the AHIP conference this afternoon (more on this shortly). Throughout her speech, she kept reiterating that AHIP has “very specific proposals” that would bend the cost-curve by 1.5 percent. She even concluded with an Obama-like rallying cry to encourage the state-based insurance executives and officials in attendance to support the process: “Yes, we can achieve reform, yes, we can make it work, and yes, we can contribute to that effort!”
“Are they going to try to storm the building?” a man in a dark business suit asked a colleague inside the Capitol Hilton ballroom, during a break in the America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) conference this afternoon. “Or are we not going to let that happen?”
Peter Harbage is a Washington DC-based health policy analyst who worked with both Senator John Edwards and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on their individual mandate proposals. He has also worked at both the Center for American Progress and the New America Foundation.
With the release of the Congressional Budget Office report on the Senate Finance health
bill, there has been significant concern about how health reform may not cover all of the uninsured. From leaders in the progressive movement (read Jon's list of top health reform issues) to Karen Ignagni's October 11 cover memo on the infamous PwC "report", people have been talking about the size of the penalty for families failing to purchase insurance. It's a good question, but it misses the point. Getting everyone covered depends on a three step process: coverage must be made affordable, coverage must be made easily available, and once that is achieved, then you can have an effective mandate and penalty.
It is this second step--making coverage easy to get--that has gotten too little attention. Six out of ten children eligible for Medicaid and CHIP (basically free coverage) are estimated to be eligible and not enrolled. The forms involved can be overly complex and the system can be difficult to navigate. In fact, today's health insurance system is seemingly designed to keep you out of insurance. Job change, marriage, change in age, all mean that you could lose your current insurance.
As the Senate Finance Committee prepares to vote on the Baucus bill, the influence of Karen Ignagni hangs over the proceedings. As the
president of America Health Insurance Plans (AHIP)--the health insurance lobby--she is a central player in the health care debate.
The first time I remember speaking with Karen Ignagni was via a TV satellite, for a debate about health care policy on CNN. It was the summer of 2007, not long after the debut of Michael Moore's Sicko, and each of us was playing our usual role. Ignagni is the telegenic president of America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) and arguably Washington's most influential health-industry lobbyist.
