| The BenefitsLink Newsletter - Welfare Plans Edition |  |
June 22, 2001
Today's sponsor: Employee Benefits Webcast (click)
Webcast coming up July 26! "Implementing Binding Arbitration for Employment Law Claims" Instructors: D. Albert Brannen, Esq. and Tracy L. Moon, Jr., Esq., Fisher & Phillips LLP. Presented by Human Resource Consultants. Click on the link above to register now and purchase this Human Resource Consultants webcast.
Opinion: Executions and HMOs
Excerpt: "And how happy we Texans are to see Washington revisiting one of our favorite old debates, the patients' bill of rights.... Basically, the line-up is your insurance companies, your HMOs and your bidness community against your doctors, your lawyers and your consumer groups. The African proverb, 'When the elephants fight, the grass gets trampled' is useful here -- the people most apt to get hurt are patients, but nobody ever mentions them." (Molly Ivins on Yahoo! News)
HMO Rates Climb Again for 2002; Increases Tied to Drug Costs, Fees
Excerpt: "Even though new rates don't take effect until January, large employers are receiving 2002 premium estimates from health plans this month. Executives at Massachusetts' three largest insurers -- Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Tufts Health Plan, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts -- said they will raise premiums an average of 8 to 15 percent. Nationally the increases may be even higher, benefits consultants said." (Knight Ridder/Tribune)
Lawmakers Feel Heat on Patients' Rights
Excerpt: "Both parties have established communication command centers near the Senate floor to take their respective cases to the public. The rooms are equipped with microphones for radio talk-show interviews, cameras for TV spots and an Internet setup for senators to conduct website chats." (New York Times Syndicate)
Texas Law on HMO Suits Could Be a Bellwether
Excerpt: "Insurance premiums will skyrocket, they say. Hundreds of thousands of people will lose their health coverage. Courts will be overrun with frivolous lawsuits by greedy trial lawyers looking to cash in. But in Texas, which enacted a patients' bill of rights in 1997 amid similar warnings, the bleak picture has not materialized." (The Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
Opinion: Self-Directed Health Plans Could Eliminate Need for Patients' Rights Bill
Excerpt: "Why do consumers need an act of Congress to make the market more responsive? ... The solution ... is not to create a bureaucratic maze of impossibly complex legislation and lawsuits. Instead, we should have a system in which people can choose the health plans that suit their needs, plans they have bought directly or through groups negotiating in their best interest." (The [Philadelphia] Inquirer)
Poll Shows Strong Support for Contraceptive Coverage
Excerpt: "Despite efforts by President Bush and some Republicans to end a requirement that health plans serving federal employees cover prescription contraceptives, a strong majority of the public favors such laws, according to the results of a nationwide poll released on Thursday." (Medscape; free registration required)
Opinion: Patients' Rights Legislation-- the Triangle of Health Insurance: Quality, Cost and Access (PDF)
Excerpt: "The proposed 'patients' rights' legislation would add an estimated $16 billion in costs to employers and insurance companies and would lead to 9 million more Americans without health insurance. This would result in higher costs financed by all insured Americans." (Employment Policy Foundation)
Opinion: Would the Corporation Limit Own Right To Sue?
Excerpt: "Jamie Court, executive director of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, responded today to a proposed HMO patients' rights compromise in Washington, D.C. The compromise would only allow patients the right to sue for damages in state court if an independent review panel of doctors decided for the patient and the HMO did not implement that decision." (Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights)
Senate Democrats Win First Skirmish Over Patients' Rights Bill
Excerpt: "Sponsors of a sweeping patients' rights bill survived their first serious test Thursday, as the Senate voted, 52 to 45, to block a Republican amendment that threatened to derail the health insurance measure." (Los Angeles Times)
Bush Demands Changes in Senate HMO Bill
Excerpt: "President Bush threatened today to veto the patients' rights bill now on the Senate floor. Democrats vowed to forge ahead with the legislation and accused Mr. Bush of standing with the health insurance industry against the American public." (New York Times; free registration required)
Opinion: 1974 Federal Law Aided HMOs, Not Workers
Excerpt: "This week's bitter Senate battle over patients' rights to sue their HMOs has its origin, oddly enough, in a 1974 pension reform law. What began as a worker-friendly measure that regulated corporations has evolved into a corporate shield against lawsuits from disgruntled employees and their families. It is a classic example of the Law of Unintended Consequences." (Los Angeles Times)
Pension and Employee Benefit Provisions of EGTRRA
The bill's provisions are summarized and published in an online chart format. (Groom Law Group)
Newly Posted or Renewed Job Openings (Post Yours!)
| Director, Sales and Marketing | for CallConnect Communications in CO |
| Defined Benefit Specialist | for Paragon Consulting Group in NJ |
Newly Posted Press Releases
| Michael Greve joins Jesse Consulting, Inc. (Jesse Consulting Company, Inc.) |
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