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2007-2008 Legislation
Bills of interest to health care consumer advocates from the 2007-2008 legislative session
Health Access California sponsors, advocates for, and tracks health consumer legislation in Sacramento.
To see the final status of health care legislation we followed in 2007-2008, click here.
2007-2008 Session Health Consumer Bills:
(AB = Assembly Bill; SB = Senate Bill)
INSURER REGULATIONS
Insurance Oversight & Market Reform
AB 2292 (Garrick) Would allow Californians who have Health Savings Accounts, linked to high deductible health plans, to qualify for state personal income tax deduction.
AB 2842 (Berg) Would protect Californians from insurance agents trying to sell them private Medicare plans through cold calls and bait-and-switch tactics.
SB 972 (McClintock) Would create organizations of small businesses that could purchase unregulated and substandard health insurance products.
SB 1522 (Steinberg): Would sort health insurance policies into five coverage categories, ranging from "comprehensive" to "catastrophic." Organization of plans into these categories would enable consumers to better track premium, benefits and cost-sharing, and assist consumers in making apples-to-apples comparisons between plans. Would weed out "junk" insurance by developing minimum benefit standards.
SB 1440 (Kuehl): Would set a minimum medical loss ratio - requiring every insurer to spend at least 85 percent of premiums on patient care.
SB 1603 (Calderon) Would give discount healthcare plans legitimacy in the state by allowing the Department of Managed Health Care to license and regulate such products.
SB 1669 (McClintock) Would allow insurance companies to exclude coverage of conditions for which an individual policyholder has received medical advice, a diagnosis, treatment, or prescription drugs at any point in the previous 10 years.
Recissions
AB 1150 (Lieu): Outlaws the industry practice of paying bonuses to insurance company employees when they rescind policies, for setting targets for rescinded policies, and/or setting financial goals based on savings on health care claims.
AB 1945 (De La Torre): Would establish an independent DMHC/DOI review process if an insurer wants to rescind coverage, and raises the standard in existing law so that coverage can only be rescinded if a consumer willfully misrepresents his health history.
AB 2549 (Hayashi) Would impose an 18-month limit in which insurers are allowed to rescind health policies for fraud once consumers' applications are accepted.
AB 2569 (DeLeon): Would require insurers to continue to cover family members if one family member rescinded and would also impose duty of honesty and accuracy on brokers who assist individuals in buying coverage.
SB 1379 (Ducheny) Would use a portion of the fines levied on insurers for improper rescissions to subsidize MRMIP and repay loans for physicians working in underserved areas.
Benefit Mandates
AB 1887 (Beall): Would require health plans to provide coverage for all diagnosable mental illnesses.
AB 1962 (De La Torre): Would require all individual insurance policies to cover maternity services.
SB 1198 (Kuehl): Would require group health plans and insurers to offer coverage for durable medical equipment, such as wheelchairs and shower seats.
Improved Insurance Options
AB 2 (Dymally): Would reform the Managed Risk Medical Insurance Program, which provides coverage for "un-insureables" who have "pre-existing conditions." Efforts would make the high risk pool more affordable and available.
SB 1379 (Ducheny) Would use a portion of the fines levied on insurers for improper rescissions to subsidize MRMIP and repay loans for physicians working in underserved areas.
HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS
Transparency: Cost and Quality Data
AB 2821 (Feuer) Would limit drug company gifts to doctors to no more than $250 annually, require disclosure of non-gift payments made to doctors and require annual public disclosure of any gifts higher than $50.
AB 2967 (Lieber): Would require public reporting of cost and quality by hospitals, HMOs, and others in the health care industry.
SB 1300 (Corbett): Would prohibit confidentiality clauses, which keep secret information on pricing and health care quality from consumers, in contracts between providers and insurers.
Doctor and Hospital Oversight
AB 2146 (Feuer): Would ban providers from billing patients or insurers when they have made an avoidable mistake, such as operating on the wrong person, prescribing the wrong drugs, or leaving foreign objects inside a surgery patient.
SB 1633 (Kuehl): Would prohibit dentists' offices from offering high-interest loans to patients while they are under the influence of anesthesia. Would also prohibit dental offices from charging lines of credit before services have been rendered.
Hospital Transactions
AB 2400 (Price): Would require public notice before closing a hospital.
AB 2697 (Huffman): Would require so-called "boutique hospitals" to assess their impact on a community's health system annually, specifically whether they siphon doctors, workers, providers from hospitals caring for less affluent populations.
AB 2741 (Torrico): Would require for-profit hospital sales to undergo health impact analyses to gauge the transaction's effects on the affected community, health care services, and the community's public interest.
Balance Billing
AB 1203 (Salas) would prevent emergency departments - which do not have a contract with a patient's insurance company - from directly billing the patient for treatment provided after a patient has been stabilized. Requires the hospital to seek payment directly from insurers.
SB 981 (Perata) Would prevent emergency physicians - who do not have a contract with a patient's insurance company - from directly billing the patient, requiring providers to seek reimbursement directly from insurers.
UNDERSERVED COMMUNITIES
AB 1472 (Leno) Would establish the California Healthy Places Act, and require state agencies to work together assess and reduce health disparities in underserved communities.
COVERAGE EXPANSION
Working Disabled
AB 851 (Brownley): Would increases eligibility for those working with disabilities to buy Medi-Cal coverage through the Medi-Cal California Working Disabled Program. Also extends the program, set to sunset September 2008.
Children's Coverage
AB 1 (Laird/Dymally): Would expand children's coverage, including the Healthy Families program, to all children in families up to 300% of poverty ($49,800 for a family of three).
SB 32 (Steinberg): Would expand children's coverage, including the Healthy Families program, to all children in families up to 300% of poverty ($49,800 for a family of three).
SB 973 (Simitian): Would create a statewide public insurer, connecting existing regional, county-based health care plans, to compete with private health care plans and provide consumers more affordable coverage choices.
SB 1168 (Runner): Would allow adult dependent children, who are still covered under their parents' health plan, to stay on that coverage even if the child takes a medically necessary leave of absence from school.
Universal Coverage
SB 840 (Kuehl): Would establish a single-payer health care system in California that would enable all residents to have health coverage.
SB 1014 (Kuehl) Would create a financing structure to pay for single-payer health care system.