Health Plan Weekly
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CVS May Join Insurers’ Home Health Care M&A Spree
CVS Health Corp. is on the verge of making a bid on home health care provider Signify Health, Inc., according to an Aug. 7 report from the Wall Street Journal. Health care insiders tell AIS Health, a division of MMIT, that CVS’s rumored move — part of a planned $25 billion transaction spree — accelerates an existing trend of diversifying health care firms buying their way into home care, even as the rate of transactions in the space slows.
CVS, the parent company of Aetna, is just the latest national health insurance firm with designs in the home care market. As the deal has not been announced, terms have not been disclosed, but Signify’s market capitalization is north of $4.5 billion, per the Journal. UnitedHealth Group, the multi-hyphenate parent company of insurer UnitedHealthcare, announced a $6 billion cash bid for home care provider LHC Group, Inc. in June.
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Health Spending Per Capita Is Expected to Grow Moderately Over Time
The COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted health spending in 2020 and its long-term health effects are adding more uncertainties looking ahead, according to the Peterson-Kaiser Family Foundation.
Health spending per capita jumped at a rate of 9.3% in 2020 from the prior year, mainly caused by the COVID-related public health activities. Meanwhile, out-of-pocket health spending declined 4.0% per capita in 2020, as a result of delayed or forgone routine care during the early months of the pandemic. Looking forward, CMS expects health spending and prescription drug spending to grow moderately through 2030, but the new COVID variants and treatments add a great deal of uncertainties to the coming years. Out-of-pocket health spending growth was expected to rebound starting in 2021 and average at a rate of 3.5% for the following seven years.
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News Briefs: UnitedHealthcare Unveils Rebranded ‘Surest’ Plans
UnitedHealthcare is rebranding a type of employer-sponsored plans previously known as Bind, promising “a new approach to health benefits that removes deductibles and provides clear upfront pricing information to people in advance of treatment.” Now known as Surest, the products are available to self-funded employer plans nationwide and fully insured customers with 51 or more employees in 11 states. The insurer aims to add up to five additional states where self-funded customers can access Surest plans by the end of the year, and notes that more than 150 employers are already using Surest.
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Telehealth, Insulin Reforms Unlikely to Pass Senate Before Winter
Reforms to telehealth and insulin pricing are stalled in Congress despite notable progress on health care policies like enhanced marketplace subsidies in recent days. D.C. insiders tell AIS Health, a division of MMIT, that comprehensive fixes to either issue are unlikely to make their way into the landmark Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA), which seems poised to pass the Senate.
Telehealth reforms have passed the House of Representatives, but insiders tell AIS Health that they are unlikely to pass the Senate. They are also not expected to be included as part of a final version of the IRA, which should emerge in the coming days. Some insulin reforms may be included in the IRA, but D.C. experts expect that reforms affecting the commercial market are unlikely to pass as part of the bill. Instead, the insulin price changes are likely to be restricted to Medicare.
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Morgan Health Study Flags Disparities in Employer-Sponsored Insurance
In a finding that could serve as a wakeup call for health insurers and their employer clients, a new study has found that significant health disparities exist among workers based on their race, ethnicity, income levels and sexuality.
Caroline Pearson, senior vice president of health care strategy at NORC at the University of Chicago, says the results show companies must do much more than simply offer coverage to their employers and need to focus on other issues impacting their health outcomes. NORC, a nonpartisan research organization, conducted the study of employer-sponsored insurance (ESI), which was sponsored by Morgan Health, the health care arm of JPMorgan Chase & Co.
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