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Left holding the bag': The price you pay for healthcare could surge next year -- here's why
MIAMI — Josefina Muralles works a part-time overnight shift as a receptionist at a Miami Beach condominium so that during the day she can care for her three kids, her aging mother, and her brother, who is paralyzed.
She helps her mother feed, bathe, and give medicine to her adult brother, Rodrigo Muralles, who has epilepsy and became disabled after contracting covid-19 in 2020.
“He lives because we feed him and take care of his personal needs,” said Josefina Muralles, 41. “He doesn’t say, ‘I need this or that.’ He has forgotten everything.”
Though her husband works full time, the arrangement means their household income is just above the federal poverty line — too high to qualify for Florida’s Medicaid program but low enough to make Muralles and her husband eligible for subsidized health insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace, also known as Obamacare.
Next year, Muralles said, she and her husband may not be able to afford that health insurance coverage, which has paid for her prescription blood thinners, cholesterol medication, and two surgeries, including one to treat a genetic disorder.
Extra subsidies put in place during the pandemic — which reduced the premiums Muralles and her husband paid by more than half, to $30 a month — are in place only through Dec. 31. Without enhanced subsidies, Affordable Care Act insurance premiums would rise by more than 75% on average, with bills for people in some states more than doubling, according to estimates from KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News.
She helps her mother feed, bathe, and give medicine to her adult brother, Rodrigo Muralles, who has epilepsy and became disabled after contracting covid-19 in 2020.
“He lives because we feed him and take care of his personal needs,” said Josefina Muralles, 41. “He doesn’t say, ‘I need this or that.’ He has forgotten everything.”
Though her husband works full time, the arrangement means their household income is just above the federal poverty line — too high to qualify for Florida’s Medicaid program but low enough to make Muralles and her husband eligible for subsidized health insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace, also known as Obamacare.
Next year, Muralles said, she and her husband may not be able to afford that health insurance coverage, which has paid for her prescription blood thinners, cholesterol medication, and two surgeries, including one to treat a genetic disorder.
Extra subsidies put in place during the pandemic — which reduced the premiums Muralles and her husband paid by more than half, to $30 a month — are in place only through Dec. 31. Without enhanced subsidies, Affordable Care Act insurance premiums would rise by more than 75% on average, with bills for people in some states more than doubling, according to estimates from KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News.
https://www.alternet.org/obamacare-cost/