Study: States Can Learn From Vermont’s Health Care Reform

[ProSense]

Study: States Can Learn From Vermont’s Health Care Reform

Kirk Carapezza

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A study published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine says other states can learn some lessons from Vermont in rolling out health exchanges that are essential to the federal Affordable Care Act.

Doctor Laura Grubb at the University of Texas wrote the report. In a phone interview Wednesday, she said other states should follow Vermont administrators' lead and take matters into their own hands.

"As opposed to having a mandate from above pushing it at you, instead, they decided to take their own initiative and go with what was best for the people of Vermont," Grubb said

In her study, Grubb points out that Vermont created the Green Mountain Care Board to slow the rising cost of health care. She says administrators have worked to reduce redundancy and improve transparency, while developing a state-exchange that will be 100 percent federally funded.

- more -

http://www.vpr.net/news_detail/98021/study-states-learn-from-vermonts-health-care-refor/

Vermont Insurance-Exchange Rates Show Savings From Health Law
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022602134

[ProSense]

1. Kick! n/t

[bluestate10]

2. A better model would be Massachusetts.

Massachusetts has an up and working exchange that works well. The Governor, Deval Patrick took over the damaged system that Romney left and over two tough years turned it around. Massachusetts learned a lot in making an insurance exchange work, the FEDs are well advised to spend lots of time talking to Massachusetts exchange administrators, in particular those that worked with Governor Patrick as he cleaned up Romney's mess.

[ProSense]

3. Massachusetts is another great model, but

I have my eye on Vermont for a specific reason.

Vermont also intends to be the first state in the U.S. with a single-payer health-care system, in which the government pays all of its residents’ medical bills and insurance companies are unnecessary. The state legislature passed a law in 2011 to steer the state toward adopting such a system in 2017, the soonest possible under the federal health-care law.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-01/vermont-s-first-look-at-insurance-exchange-rates-shows-savings.html