Biden stimulus plan affects health care

The $1.9 trillion Biden stimulus plan will impact healthcare in America in a variety of ways. We spoke with Dr. Swapna Reddy of ASU’s College of Health Solutions about that, and what is happening with the issue of reproductive rights in state legislatures around the country.

When discussing the stimulus bill Dr. Reddy said, “This is a pretty big deal. This stimulus plan was passed last Thursday and it is being billed as one of the largest expansions of health, for health insurance, since the passing of the Affordable Care Act in 2010. So pretty big deal, especially for folks who don’t have insurance or need help affording insurance or especially the thousands of Americans who have found themselves either without a job through this pandemic or reduced hours so they don’t have health insurance through their job anymore.”

She continued to explain, “What we’re seeing in this stimulus bill are major increases in subsidies for the ACA marketplaces so the largest kind of pieces of health are those that are very low income, but also, and this is really key, for the first time a family of four that’s making over $100,000, a little over $100,000, qualifies for subsidies. So really across the gambit help fro ACA marketplace affordability, and we know that those marketplace plans are pretty important because they offer comprehensive health insurance that simply isn’t available in lots of kind of off-market plans.”

There are many pieces to the stimulus bill that Dr. Reddy pointed out as important. Another one of those was the extension to Cobra benefits.

“Folks can qualify for free Cobra coverage for up to six months and this is really important because we know that thousands have lost their employment and around half of those folks who depended on employer-based coverage through their job have lost that coverage.”