This story was updated at 12:37 p.m. on Sept. 13, 2019. See the shaded box below for the update. Gov. Jared Polis, standing before a crowd in Keystone, unveiled an eye-popping number on Monday. $14,000. That is how much he said a family of four in Summit County will be able to save on their […]
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Posted inHealth, News
How much does an ER visit cost in Colorado? It depends on where you go.
Take a deep breath and imagine an unpleasant scenario: It’s late at night, your kid is really sick and you need to go to the emergency room. How much are you going to be charged just to walk through the door? The answer, according to a new analysis by a Colorado nonprofit, varies widely depending […]
Posted inHealth, News, Politics and Government
With objections from Canada and drug companies, Colorado’s plan to import prescription medicines could be in trouble
To Colorado officials charged with developing one of the nation’s first state programs to import cheaper prescription drugs from Canada, the announcement last month by U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar seemed like great news. Not only was the Trump administration changing course after initially being skeptical of such importation schemes, but it […]
Posted inHealth, News, Politics and Government
Gov. Polis is looking to take innovative Summit County health insurance alliance model statewide
Fresh off winning federal approval for one major health insurance program and still at work building another, Colorado officials are already moving on to their next big health policy idea: A statewide alliance of employers, modeled after one in Summit County, that would give organizations better leverage to negotiate health care prices for their employee […]
Posted inBusiness, Health, News, Politics and Government
Colorado’s reinsurance program is the biggest thing to happen to health care in the state in years. It might not last.
Colorado officials announced Wednesday that the state’s reinsurance program — responsible for what is projected to be a dramatic decline in health insurance prices for some people in 2020 — has received federal approval and, thus, will go into effect. This is not a small deal. “It’s the biggest tangible step we’ve seen in reducing […]
Posted inHealth, News, Politics and Government
A Colorado plan to dramatically lower health insurance prices for some now awaits federal approval
Colorado’s reinsurance program — which would lower health insurance premiums for some by using state and federal dollars to help insurance companies pay their most expensive claims — is starting to take shape, but it still faces a significant hurdle: winning approval from the federal government. State regulators last week submitted an application for the […]
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Another possible reason for high health prices in Colorado: a lack of competition among hospitals and insurance companies
Residents of Telluride have a lot of good things going for them — world-class skiing, jaw-dropping vistas — but access to a wide variety of health care choices is not on that list. There’s only one insurance company offering health plans in the individual market in Telluride’s home county, San Miguel. The nearest full-service hospital […]
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How much do you pay for hospital services in Colorado? Likely many times more than what Medicare does.
Across Colorado, hospitals regularly charge patients with private insurance three or four times what Medicare pays for the same services, according to a groundbreaking new study from the RAND Corp. that will likely further increase pressure on hospitals in the state to lower their prices. The RAND study looked at hospital prices in 25 states […]
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To fund their No. 1 health care priority, Colorado lawmakers look to a new source: Money originally earmarked for affordable housing
Colorado lawmakers wrestled their top health care priority back from the brink Thursday but had to cut into a potential funding source that another bill has earmarked for affordable housing. It was just the latest near-death experience for a bill to create a reinsurance program, which would help health insurers pay some of their highest-cost […]
Posted inBusiness, Health, News, Politics and Government
Colorado lawmakers’ latest plan to slash health insurance prices could risk billions in federal funding
Colorado lawmakers’ latest plan to reduce health insurance prices has hit a major snag: If it passes, the state could potentially lose out on more than $2 billion annually that it currently receives, including more than $1 billion a year in Medicaid money from the federal government. The problem has to do with how lawmakers […]