Under President Obama’s health care overhaul law, today was supposed to be the deadline for individual states to declare whether they will create their own health insurance marketplace, partner with another state or cede oversight of the exchange to the federal government. But late yesterday, the federal government extended the deadline to Dec. 14.
Jay S. Himmelstein, MD, MPH, professor of family medicine & community health and medicine, is principal investigator for the Massachusetts Early Innovator Cooperative Agreement, a collaboration established to support health care reform through the creation of health insurance exchange information technology components for Massachusetts that are consumer-focused, cost-effective and sustainable. They can also be leveraged by other states to operate health insurance exchanges. In this Expert’s Corner video, Dr. Himmelstein discusses the importance of the looming deadline and the next step for developing health insurance exchanges in each state.
