The Obama administration has quietly delayed another key element of the Affordable Care Act, the New York Times reported Tuesday, exempting some insurers for a year from the new limit on out-of-pocket expenses.
The Affordable Care Act, signed into law in 2010, explicitly set annual limits -- $6,350 for individuals and $12,700 for a family -- on out-of-pocket expenses. Mr. Obama touted the reform as one of the many consumer protections his sweeping health care law would include to make insurance more affordable.
Now, however, some insurers won't have to follow the limit until 2015. Rather than imposing a $6,350 limit on all out-of-pocket expenses, some insurers will have to impose a $6,350 limit on medical expenses, plus a separate $6,350 limit on prescription drug expenses. Other insurers, meanwhile, won't have to apply a limit at all to prescription drug costs.
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