New Health Reform Law Will Benefit 30 Million Women, Study Says

July 30, 2010 — Thirty million women will benefit from the new national health reform law (PL 111-148), a recent analysis by the Commonwealth Fund found, CQ HealthBeat reports. The law will help 15 million uninsured women gain access to subsidized coverage and also will improve cost and quality issues for 14.5 million women who are currently insured, the report found (Norman, CQ HealthBeat, 7/30).

The law will help roughly 15 million of the 17 million uninsured U.S. women obtain health coverage with federal assistance. Half of those women will qualify for Medicaid once eligibility is expanded, while the other half will benefit from government subsidies to purchase insurance on the state insurance exchanges that will be established in 2014 (Goldstein, Washington Post, 7/30). Nearly 40% of women who tried to purchase coverage through the individual insurance market over a three-year period were rejected by insurers, were charged higher prices than other consumers or were denied coverage because of a pre-existing medical condition, the report found (CQ HealthBeat, 7/30).

The law requires plans sold in the exchanges to cover certain federally defined services, including care for pregnant women. Nearly nine of out 10 health plans on the individual market currently lack maternity coverage (Washington Post, 7/30).

Other provisions of the law that could be beneficial to women include the extension of family coverage to young adult children, a ban on lifetime coverage limits, phased-in restrictions on annual benefit limits, improved coverage of preventive services and $250 rebate checks for prescription coverage for some Medicare beneficiaries, the report's author notes (CQ HealthBeat, 7/30). In addition, women -- particularly those who develop breast cancer -- could benefit from rules scheduled to take effect in September that bar insurers from rescinding coverage for enrollees who become sick (Washington Post, 7/30).