Insurers are raising the 2017 premiums for a popular and significant group of health plans sold through HealthCare.gov by an average of 25 percent, more than triple the increase for this year, according to new government figures.
The spike in average rates for the 38 states that rely on the federal marketplace created under the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as “Obamacare,” was announced by federal health officials on Monday. The figures serve broadly to confirm what has become evident piecemeal in recent months: Prompted by a burden of unexpectedly sick ACA customers, some insurers are dropping out while many remaining companies are struggling to cover their costs.
The steep increase of 25 percent is the average for the health plans on which the ACA’s tax credits are based each year – the policy in each part of the country that has the second-lowest rate among plans offering a “silver” tier of coverage.
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. – The National Transportation Safety Board investigating the collision of passenger bus with a semitrailer on Interstate 10 near Palm Springs, indicates the bus driver never braked before plowing into the semi.
The crash killed the bus driver and 12 passengers and injured 31 other people, making it one of the deadliest wrecks in California history.
The truck was creeping along at 5 mph because of utility work that had gone on throughout the night along Interstate 10 near Palm Springs. That’s when the bus, moving as fast as 65 mph, slammed into it, authorities said.
“There’s no indication whatsoever that the driver applied the brakes,” said California Highway Patrol Border Division Chief Jim Abele, citing the power of the impact and the fact that no skid marks were found.
LOS ANGELES – In one of the most dramatic personal transformations in American political history, Tom Hayden went from being a famed 1960s and 1970s student radical to a mainstream elected official and elder statesman of the country's left. He died Sunday at age 76 following a lengthy illness.
Hayden will be forever linked to riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, Vietnam War protests of the 1970s and his onetime marriage to actress Jane Fonda.
Those events, however, ultimately represented just a small slice of a life dedicated to, as he put it, trying to change the world. Elected to the California Assembly in 1982, Hayden served 10 years, followed by eight more in the state Senate.
QUETTA, Pakistan – Gunmen stormed a police training center in Pakistan’s restive southwestern province of Baluchistan on Monday, killing at least one person and wounding 88 others, hours after another attack killed two customs officers and wounded a third, authorities said.
Two of the gunmen were also killed in the counter-terrorism operation that continued hours after the attack began.
Associated Press
