YID With LID: White House Tells Insurance Industry: SHUT UP About Obamacare-Caused Rate Hikes Or Else

Great article from YID With LID: White House Tells Insurance Industry: SHUT UP About Obamacare-Caused Rate Hikes Or Else regarding the heavy handed HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius' veiled threat to the insurance industry that if they raise premiums for coverage with the explanation that the new Affordable Health Care Act requires them to provide more coverage, they may find themselves not being able to participate in the Obamacare pool of insurers. "The White House wants the insurance companies silenced, HHS Secretary Sebelius sent a letter to the AHIP an insurance industry advocacy group. The letter written in a threatening tone said in part:

Given the importance of the new protections and the facts about their impact on costs, I ask for your help in stopping misinformation and scare tactics about the Affordable Care Act. Moreover, I want AHIP’s members to be put on notice: the Administration, in partnership with states, will not tolerate unjustified rate hikes in the name of consumer protections. "

The insurance industry is trying to remain solvent in a time when they are being forced into issuing policies with mandated coverages that expose them to more risk and exposure. The across the board "generic" policy coverage mandate will necessarily raise the cost of each policy - who does not understand this? (other than the White House) In a related article by Michael F. Cannon at Cato at Liberty he describes in more detail the impact the Affordable Care Act will have on several health insurers. He states "The Journal even included this handy chart, where the blue bars show how much ObamaCare will add to the cost of certain health plans in 2011."

What is alarming is that, instead of the White House understanding the impact of their Affordable Care Act and working with the industry to reduce the  all-inclusive coverage demands of this act, they instead send a threatening letter basically telling the insurance companies to just SHUT UP about it!