Kansas Governor Sam Brownback wants to wait until after the upcoming Presidential election before setting up his state’s health insurance exchange. Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger wants her state to have an insurance exchange. The two are clearly at odds over how to deal with the Supreme Court’s decision.
I am starting to see a pattern here. Recently, the Governor of Nebraska, Dave Heineman, (who is a Republican), decided to wait and see how the 2012 Presidential election turns out before complying with the Affordable Care Act. He does not want to work on creating a state health insurance exchange for Nebraska.
In Kansas, Governor Sam Brownback, (who is a Republican), also has stated that he wants to wait until after the upcoming Presidential election before complying with the Affordable Care Act, and creating a state health insurance exchange for Kansas. He said:
“If the American people don’t want Obamacare, it’s a political issue, and it’s about this fall presidential race, whether or not you want to implement it. I want to see what happens in the fall.”
Here are a few facts about this situation. All states are required to operate a health insurance exchange in 2014. All states must submit plans about how their exchanges will operate to the federal government, for approval, by January 1, 2013. There is another deadline for states that aren’t preparing their own exchanges. The deadline is to certify that they will participate in an exchange that is run, in part, by the federal government. That deadline is November 16, 2012.
According to data from the United States Census Bureau, Kansas has approximately 350,000 residents who lack health insurance coverage. That comes out to about 12.7% of the population of Kansas. Around 53,000 of the uninsured are children. In 2011, Governor Brownback returned a $31.5 million federal grant that was supposed to help Kansas with the necessary computer infrastructure for their health insurance exchange.
Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger (who is also a Republican), is at odds with Governor Sam Brownback and the other Republicans. She has described the law that requires all states to make an exchange as a “market driven” step towards ensuring access to health care for all Americans.
She says that it is too late for Kansas to set up a completely state run health insurance exchange. However, there is still the chance for the state to partner with the federal government in creating one. Unfortunately, she seems to be the only government official in Kansas who wants to work on an exchange.
Image by Michael Dawes on Flickr