DENVER — The longest government shutdown in U.S. history is now over, though it comes at a potentially high cost for millions of Americans who rely on the Affordable Care Act for their health insurance.
The government shutdown ended Wednesday night without a deal to extend expiring federal tax credits for those who get their health care through the Affordable Care Act.
In Colorado, 225,000 people are facing an average doubling of their health insurance costs, according to the Colorado Division of Insurance (DOI).
The department estimates 75,000 of those Coloradans could lose access to their healthcare if those tax credits aren't extended.
Denver7 reached out to DOI about the federal tax credits expiring. The Colorado Insurance Commissioner provided the following statement:
“Now that the government has reopened, I am urging Congress to immediately turn to extending enhanced premium tax credits. Even now that Open Enrollment has started, it is not too late. We vastly prefer messy to abject disaster, which will be the case if Congress does not extend the tax credits. We’re talking an average doubling of health insurance costs for 225,000 Coloradans, which we estimate will lead to 75,000 of them losing access to health care if tax credits are not extended. The time for action is now, and we at DOI stand ready to respond.”
On Thursday, Denver7 spoke with Irina Lister, who has gotten her health insurance through the Affordable Care Act for the past year.
She told Denver7 she's facing a 23% monthly increase for her new premium, adding it would increase what she's paying monthly by more than $100.
"That, you know, honestly, is manageable for our family at this point, although we will be shopping for other plans," she said. "We are fortunate that we're healthy, and I'm the one on the marketplace, so I'm a healthy individual, and I barely used my insurance plan last this past year."
Lister acknowledged she feels lucky, but realizes thousands of other families are in tougher spots if they get their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.
"It's a frustration for me, but I understand for some families, it's not just a frustration, it's a major burden," Lister told Denver7.
At Denver Health, concern is also high. Dr. Steve Federico, the Chief of Government Community Affairs for Denver Health told Denver7 he expects thousands of families to be impacted.
"Almost 10,000 patients buy their health insurance through Denver Health in this marketplace space, many of them get help through the Affordable Care Act subsidies to pay their premiums on a monthly basis," he said. "We're talking about are middle-income families. These are working families."
He continued, "You're talking about hard working families who get their health insurance in this manner and will no longer be able to afford it, likely, sadly. We'll see more families foregoing care, meaning not getting primary care, not getting the basic care that they need, waiting until they get sick, or maybe not filling prescriptions that they need and we've seen this repetitively over time. When people lack health insurance, it ends up costing everybody more, costs the family more, costs the system more because they wait longer to get care."
- Scripps News Group reported on what this means for the country as a whole. You can watch their report in the video player below:
Denver7 reached out to Colorado Rep. Gabe Evans, who voted to reopen the government Wednesday night. He said he was glad the government was back up and running, but blamed Democrats for the lack of action on the expiring federal tax credits.
"Republicans didn't have anything to do with this. This is the sunset that Democrats put into these subsidies," he told Denver7.
We also reached out to Colorado Congresswoman Brittany Petterson, a Democrat, who disagreed with Evans' statement.
"We've been sounding the alarm for two years that we had to extend these tax credits, and the Republicans have failed to do that," she said.
Though, with just over a month-and-a-half until those tax credits expire and premiums go up for millions of Americans who rely on the Affordable Care Act for their health insurance, concern is all that's left.
"As a consumer of a very important service that we use every day. Sometimes it's life or death," Lister told Denver7.
