Immediate Changes

At the time of this posting, it is being reported President Obama will sign the recently passed health care bill into law. While most of the provisions will not take affect until 2014, below is 10 things that will begin immediately once the bill is signed.

• Prohibit pre-existing condition exclusions for children in all new plans;


• Provide immediate access to insurance for uninsured Americans who are uninsured because of a pre-existing condition through a temporary high-risk pool;


• Prohibit dropping people from coverage when they get sick in all individual plans;


• Lower seniors' prescription drug prices by beginning to close the donut hole;


• Offer tax credits to small businesses to purchase coverage;


• Eliminate lifetime limits and restrictive annual limits on benefits in all plans;


• Require plans to cover an enrollee's dependent children until age 26;


• Require new plans to cover preventive services and immunizations without cost-sharing;


• Ensure consumers have access to an effective internal and external appeals process to appeal new insurance plan decisions;


• Require premium rebates to enrollees from insurers with high administrative expenditures and require public disclosure of the percent of premiums applied to overhead costs.
  (source: The Huffington Post, Rep. John Larson)

Furthermore, The Christian Science Monitor also has a 6 part series article on health care. This shows most of what is in involved with the bill, including how the government is going to pay for it, who has to pay for insurance, and what it means for businesses. You can view the article, as well as the other parts, here.