Latest Health Insurance Headlines

All the headlines from our Health Insurance Topic Page, ordered by recency.

N.Y. Gov. Cuomo Orders Statewide Health Insurance Exchange

Apr 13 2012 // Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued an executive order Thursday to establish a statewide health insurance exchange intended to reduce coverage costs for individuals, small businesses and local governments.The New York Health Benefit...

N.Y. Financial Services Chief Pushes for State Health Exchange

Mar 23 2012 // New York State’s top financial regulator is urging the Republican majority in the state’s Senate to help establish the health insurance exchange.Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the Democrat-controlled Assembly, along...

6 Ways Supreme Court Could Rule on Healthcare Law

Mar 21 2012 // The Supreme Court has several options in ruling on President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, from upholding the law to striking it down in its entirety. The court also could avoid deciding the law’s...

Maryland Lt. Gov. Launches Health Insurance Marketing Campaign

Mar 21 2012 // Maryland Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown wants to increase the number of applications to a federally funded health insurance program run by the state. Brown kicked off the second anniversary of the federal Affordable Care Act on...

Supreme Court Readies for Healthcare Debate

Mar 19 2012 // Death, taxes and now health insurance? Having a medical plan or else paying a fine is about to become another certainty of American life, unless the Supreme Court says no.People are split over the wisdom of President...

Administration Issues Rules for State-Run Health Insurance Exchanges

Mar 12 2012 // The Obama administration on Monday released broad new operating rules for state-run health insurance exchanges, which form a key part of the 2010 federal healthcare reform law that will face landmark Supreme Court hearings...

Oklahoma Leaders Shelve Plan for Insurance Exchange

Mar 12 2012 // Oklahoma legislative leaders said on March 8 they are shelving a plan to comply with the new federal health care law by setting up a state health insurance exchange.In a joint statement, House Speaker Kris Steele and...

Oregon Senate Approves Health Insurance Exchange

Mar 7 2012 // The Oregon Senate has approved a measure implementing an online marketplace where individuals and small businesses can shop for health insurance coverage. The vote on Monday sends the measure to Gov. John Kitzhaber, who...

N.Y. Launches Audit of Rising Health Insurance Rates

Mar 5 2012 // The New York State Department of Financial Services said it has launched a wide-ranging probe of the accuracy of the data used by insurers and health maintenance organizations (HMOs) to request health insurance rate...

Dallas Doctor, 6 Others Arrested in $375M Health Care Fraud Scheme

Mar 1 2012 // A physician and the office manager of his medical practice, along with five owners of home health agencies, were arrested today on charges related to their alleged participation in a nearly $375 million health care fraud...

Health Insurer Anthem Loses Appeal to Maine Supreme Court

Mar 1 2012 // The Maine supreme court has rejected health insurer Anthem’s claim that it has a right to a 3-percent profit and risk margin when setting individual health insurance premiums. Maine’s insurance superintendent...

Florida Lawmakers Keep Their Health Premiums Below Other State Workers’

Mar 1 2012 // Florida legislators, saying that they differ from rank-and-file state workers, have killed an effort to force themselves to pay more for their health insurance.The 160 members in the Florida Legislature pay among the...

Penn. Insurance Department Forms New Health Insurance Assistance Unit

Feb 28 2012 // The Pennsylvania Insurance Department announced last week it has formed a new consumer unit to respond to questions about health insurance.“This new unit supplements our health insurance complaint-handling...

RAND Study: Ending Individual Mandate Would Cut Coverage, Hike Government’s Costs

Feb 21 2012 // Eliminating the federal mandate in the new healthcare law that every individual carry health insurance would sharply lower the number of people gaining coverage, but would not dramatically increase the cost of buying...

Insurance Companies Dodge Billion-Dollar Bullet in California

Feb 21 2012 // Court Limits What Medical Bills Juries Can ViewInsurance companies, and ultimately California consumers, avoided a windfall sought by the Consumer Attorneys of California to the tune of more than $3 billion dollars per...

Wisconsin Denied Medical Loss Ratio Waiver

Feb 21 2012 // The federal government has rejected Wisconsin’s request to phase in a requirement that health insurers spent 80 cents of every dollar in premiums on medical care, one of the provisions of the Obama...

North Carolina Wins Delay on Medical Loss Ratio

Feb 21 2012 // Federal regulators last week allowed North Carolina insurers a one-year delay in meeting a benchmark requiring that more of each health insurance premium dollar to go toward medical services and less toward overhead and...

Compensation Freeze Comes to an End?

Feb 20 2012 // It looks like the freeze may be over. For the first time since 2008, independent agency salaries rose in 2011, albeit only slightly.According to Insurance Journal‘s annual Agency Salary Survey, the average salary...

Long-time California Insurance Lobbyist Looks to 2012 Legislation

Feb 20 2012 // John Norwood is one of California’s best known legislative advocates for the insurance and financial services sectors.Norwood, principal of Norwood & Associates, has garnered recognition for his political work...

N.Y. Regulators Launch Audit of Rising Health Insurance Rates

Feb 16 2012 // The New York State Department of Financial Services has launched a wide-ranging probe of the accuracy of the data used by insurers and health maintenance organizations (HMOs) to request health insurance rate...