Illinois Health Reform Healthcare Reform

Illinois Health Reform

Healthcare Reform Initiatives in Illinois

The federal Affordable Care Act had and continues to have many ramifications for state health insurance regulations and healthcare delivery systems, and several concurrent and/or attendant state initiatives have also reformed healthcare in the individual states. In Illinois, the Affordable Care Act had near-immediate effects on healthcare reform and sparked several state initiatives for healthcare reform, and other healthcare and budgetary concerns in the state were responsible for further or concurrent initiatives. The following paragraphs briefly outline some of the most recent healthcare reform initiatives seen in Illinois.

Along with all other states, Illinois gained the authority to regulate health insurance premium increases following the signing of the Affordable Care Act into law, including the ability to deny proposed rate changes that the state deems are inappropriate for private insurance companies to levy (Graham, 2010). The Illinois Comprehensive Health Insurance Program or ICHIP will also be significantly changed, with cost burdens shifted from enrolled member premiums (which ranged from $12,000 to $16,000-year per person) to a greater reliance on general revenue, cutting most premiums in half or more (Graham, 2010). Perhaps most significantly, Illinois' national record-holding rescission rate was markedly reduced due to the Affordable Healthcare Act's ban on rescissions that occurred for any reason other than fraud (Graham, 2010). With insurance companies less able to drop people found to have a prior reason that would have allowed denial of insurance or a higher rate of insurance premiums, more people would remain covered through their private policies and burdens on taxpayers and on the state would be significantly reduced (Graham, 2010).

Also in response to the Affordable Care Act but showing more initiative and more comprehensive attention and control than many other states, Illinois' healthcare exchange or market is also a significant step forward in healthcare reform for the state (state of Illinois, 2012). The Consumer-Oriented and Operated Plans or CO-OP exchange will allow a variety of organizations, from traditional insurers to community-based organizations to coalitions of small-businesses, to become health insurers and to offer health insurance plans on an open and transparent market (State of Illinois, 2012). Illinois' preparedness and its clear and direct actions towards fulfilling the requirements and incentivized elements of the Affordable Care Act has enabled the state to collect a substantial amount of funding from the federal government for several of the programs already mentioned, further bolstering what the state is able to do for its citizens in terms of healthcare provision and regulation (State of Illinois, 2012).