California won't extend canceled health policies [View all]

[Jesus Malverde]

Covered California, the state's health exchange, has rejected President Obama's request to let insurers extend their current health policies, a decision that affects about 1 million Californians who have coverage that doesn't comply with the requirements of the federal health law.

The unanimous vote came Thursday at a meeting in Sacramento of Covered California's five-member board of directors. It means that the agency will continue to require the 11 health insurers that sell coverage through the exchange to terminate by Dec. 31 those individual policies that do not meet all the standards of the Affordable Care Act.

Peter Lee, Covered California's executive director, said extending the deadline would not help consumers. "Our board decided pushing problem down road and leading to potentially more confusion ... was actually too big of a risk," he said during a press conference after the vote.

Obama made the request last week after millions of policyholders around the country received notice they would have to change policies despite the president's promise that anyone wanted to keep their health plan could do so. The controversy only added to the debacle surrounding the launch of the health law's federal website.

http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/California-won-t-extend-canceled-health-policies-4999805.php

Covered California also released more detailed enrollment information. As of Tuesday, nearly 79,900 people had enrolled in a health plan through the exchange, and another 135,000 had enrolled in Medi-Cal.