Another Nail in the Obamacare Coffin

Congress shouldn’t do anything. Let this 100% Democrat-approved disaster die the death it deserves. Let everyone see the strength and wisdom of Democrat ideas:

Health insurance giant Aetna said Wednesday that it will not be participating in any Obamacare exchanges in 2018.

"Our individual commercial products lost nearly $700 million between 2014 and 2016, and are projected to lose more than $200 million in 2017 despite a significant reduction in membership," T.J. Crawford, Aetna spokesman, said in an email.

The reason for the losses, he said, came from structural issues within the exchanges "that have led to co-op failures and carrier exits, and subsequent risk pool deterioration." He did not cite uncertainty over the future of Obamacare, as the company had done when it announced last week that it would be exiting the exchange in Virginia.

Aetna also announced in early April that it would be pulling out of the exchange in Iowa, and the latest announcement adds Delaware and Nebraska to that list, both on and off the exchange.

Aetna is only the most recent company to pull out of Obamacare exchanges.

Update, 5/14/17:  Where's that $2500/family savings?

Early moves by insurers suggest that another round of price hikes and limited choices will greet insurance shoppers around the country when they start searching for next year’s coverage on the public markets established by the Affordable Care Act.

Insurance companies are still making decisions about whether to offer coverage for individuals next year on these markets, and price increase requests are only just starting to be revealed by state regulators. But in recent weeks, big insurers like Aetna and Humana have been dropping out of markets or saying that they aren’t ready to commit. And regulators in Virginia and Maryland have reported early price hike requests ranging from just under 10 percent to more than 50 percent.

Note that this story is from the Associated Press, which is not known for a conservative bias.