[CarolynS]

Kaiser Family Foundation, Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Questions About the New Health Reform Law?


Do you have questions about the new health reform law?
• How are small businesses affected by health reform?
• Will everyone have to buy health insurance?
• How will the new provision allowing young adults to remain on a parent's insurance work?

The FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) section of Kaiser’s new Health Reform Source provides concise answers to common questions about the health reform law. You can search for your question or submit a new question if yours is not addressed.

Additional questions addressing the affordability of health insurance, how programs like Medicare and Medicaid will be financed under health reform and others are addressed in a series of Video Explainer clips featuring Foundation experts answering specific questions about the law on a variety of health policy topics.
Kaiser’s Health Reform Source, an online gateway providing easy access to new and comprehensive resources on the health reform law, provides these and other new features and tools including an interactive timeline showing when health reform provisions take effect, all the latest polling data, links to other information resources, and the latest health reform headlines from Kaiser Health News. We encourage organizations and individuals to link to these resources.


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How does the new health reform law change the Medicare Part D coverage gap, sometimes called the "doughnut hole"?

The health reform law gradually reduces the amount that Medicare Part D enrollees are required to pay for their prescriptions when they reach the coverage gap. In 2010, Part D enrollees with any out-of-pocket spending in the coverage gap will receive a $250 rebate. Beginning in 2011, Part D enrollees will receive a 50 percent discount on the total cost of their brand-name drugs in the coverage gap, as agreed to by pharmaceutical manufacturers. Over time, Medicare will gradually phase in additional subsidies in the coverage gap for brand-name drugs (beginning in 2013) and generic drugs (beginning in 2011), reducing the beneficiary coinsurance rate in the gap from 100 percent to 25 percent by 2020. In addition, between 2014 and 2019, the law reduces the out-of-pocket amount that qualifies an enrollee for catastrophic coverage, further reducing out-of-pocket costs for those with relatively high prescription drug expenses. In 2020, the level will revert to that which it would have been absent these reductions.