Doctors urged to treat obesity like any other ailment; New guidelines say do whatever it takes to get the pounds off
Originally posted November 13, 2013 by Nanci Hellmich on www6.lexisnexis.com
There's no ideal diet that's right for everyone, but that shouldn't stop the nation's doctors from helping their heavy patients battle weight issues as aggressively as things like blood pressure, according to new obesity treatment guidelines released Tuesday.
The guidelines, from three leading health groups, say that doctors need to help obese patients figure out the best plan, whether it's a vegetarian diet, low-sodium plan, commercial weight-loss program or a low-carb diet.
Still, the most effective behavior-change weight-loss programs include two to three in-person meetings a month for at least six months, and most people should consume at least 500 fewer calories a day to lose weight, the recommendations say.
The guidelines are designed to help health care providers aggressively tackle the obesity epidemic. "The overall objective is quite a tall order: to get primary care practitioners to own weight management as they own hypertension management," says obesity researcher Donna Ryan, co-chairwoman of the committee writing these guidelines for the Obesity Society, American Heart Association and American College of Cardiology.
The recommendations are part of a set of heart disease prevention guidelines released Tuesday.
Nearly 155 million U.S. adults are overweight or obese, which is roughly 35 pounds over a healthy weight. Extra pounds put people at a higher risk of heart disease, stroke, many types of cancer, type 2 diabetes and a host of other health problems.
Health care providers should encourage obese and overweight patients who need to drop pounds for health reasons to lose at least 5% to 10% of their weight by following a moderately reduced-calorie diet suited to their food tastes and health status, while being physically active and learning behavioral strategies.
"The gold standard is an intervention delivered by trained interventionists (not just registered dietitians or doctors) for at least 14 sessions in the first six months and then continue therapy for a year," says Ryan, a professor emeritus at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge. If this kind of intensive therapy is not available, then other types of treatment, such as commercial weight-loss programs or telephone and Web-based programs, are good "second choices," she says.
Medicare began covering behavioral counseling for obese patients last year, and under the Affordable Care Act, most private insurance companies are expected to cover behavioral counseling and other obesity treatments by next year.
"There is no ideal diet for weight loss, and there is no superiority between the many diets we looked at," Ryan says. "We examined about 17 different weight-loss diets."
Pat O'Neil, director of the Weight Management Center at Medical University of South Carolina, says, "The diet you follow is the one that's going to work for you. That's good information for the public to have."
The report advises health care providers to calculate body mass index (a number that takes into account height and weight) at annual visits or more frequently, and use it to identify adults who may be at a higher risk of heart disease and stroke. Evidence shows that the greater the BMI, the higher the risk of coronary heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and death from any cause, the report says. "BMI is a quick and easy first step," Ryan says.
The guidelines are being published simultaneously in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Association; the Journal of the American College of Cardiology; and Obesity: Journal of the Obesity Society.
6 wellness tips for flu prevention
Originally posted on benefitnews.com
The flu costs businesses approximately $10.4 billion in direct costs for hospitalizations and out-patient visits for adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In addition to encouraging workers to get immunized, employers can further minimize employee sick days and slow the spread of illness by communicating best practices in wellness and nutrition. Share these six preventive tips from Dr. Bruce Underwood, a certified nutrition and preventive care specialist with Healthy Futures, Inc., to keep workers and their families healthy this season.
No matter whether an individual decides to get immunized for influenza, primary prevention should be their priority for avoiding illness. Dr. Underwood explains that a good basis for our immune system is to get a good night’s sleep, generally between six to eight hours every night.
The surgeon general recommends all adults walk at least 10,000 steps or about 4 miles every day. If we over-exercise, then our immune system is weakened for a few days, explains Underwood. However, if we don't exercise at all our immune system is also weak.
As the following three slides prove, we need vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and fatty acids for our bodies to work well. Overall, Underwood recommends eating a wide variety of foods in amounts that allow you to maintain an ideal body weight.
One of the most important vitamins for immune health is vitamin C. The upper safe limit for Vitamin C is 2,000 mg for adults, according to the National Institute of Health. Underwood and other experts recommend 1,000 mg of the vitamin as a good daily dose. Dietary sources of the vitamin come mainly from fruits and vegetables, but can also be found in certain cuts of meat, especially liver. Studies have shown that our bodies expend Vitamin C to mitigate toxins such as cigarette smoke and pollution. The antioxidant has also helps relieve the physical and psychological effects of stress on people.
5. Zinc
The mineral Zinc is also necessary in stressful situations. By ingesting 10 to 40 milligrams of Zinc each day, individuals can also help build up their immune system. Underwood advises people to keep their daily dosage under 100 mg per day, however, as too much of the metal might cause fever, coughing, stomach pain, fatigue, and many other problems. Meats, seafood, dairy products, nuts, legumes, and whole grains offer relatively high levels of zinc.
For one year, White House revives health plans canceled under ACA
Originally posted November 14, 2013 by Tristan Lejeune and Brian M. Kalish on https://ebn.benefitnews.com
President Barack Obama announced that Americans whose health care plans have been canceled because they fall short of Affordable Care Act standards have been granted a one-year reprieve. With the decision, state governors and insurance commissioners would have the authority to keep would-be canceled plans active until the end of 2014.
“The Affordable Care Act is going to work for the American people,” Obama said from the White House briefing room in remarks that opened with sympathy and support for the typhoon-ravaged Philippines. Obama acknowledged that his team “fumbled the roll-out of the health care law,” but he hopes that extending existing plans will help win “back the confidence of the American people.”
The decision, which helps live up to a promise Obama made when pushing for passage of health reform, is couched as an administrative fix that says following ACA will not require insurance companies to upgrade their plan for individuals who have been in these existing plans so far. In what the White House is calling “an extension of grandfathering principle” Americans should now all be able to re-enroll in their current coverage so long as it is still offered by their provider.
“Two important things we require from insurance companies,” says the administration, “one is they notify consumers what protections these renewed plans do not include. And two, they notify consumers that they will have new options available on the marketplace that offer better coverage, and tax credits are available for many people.”
Insurers and participants in the individual and small group markets will not be considered noncompliant in these plans next year. This is a policy “targeted and very targeted” to those individuals who are in those policies today, it is not allowing to be sold to people not in plans. IN other words, the policy change only applies to extant plans; all new plans must comply with Obamacare in full.
Next year is an election cycle for 33 senators and the entire House of Representatives. This move will widely be seen as trying to appease voters furious about having their plans canceled after pledges were repeatedly made that exactly that would not happen.
State authorities can still decide to consider plans non-compliant next year and insist insurers get up to speed.
Obama said that Healthcare.gov enrollment is “absolutely not” where he wants it to be, “but there’s no question that there’s great demand for high-quality health care,” and he urged health care consumers not to try to throw out the baby with the bathwater and return to the landscape circa 2009.
“It’s important that we pretend that that’s not a place worth going back to,” Obama said. “And that’s why I will not accept proposals that are just a brazen attempt to overturn the law and go back to a broken system.”
He added: "This fix won't solve every problem for every person but it will help a lot of people. Doing more will require work with Congress."
Manage chronic diseases with smartphones and smart-tech inhalers
Originally posted November 5, 2013 by Kathleen Koster on benefitnews.com
If people with chronic conditions only spend about an hour a year with their physician, how can they stay adherent with medication and their disease education for the 8,759 hours they’re outside the doctor’s office? The most promising answer is through mobile devices.
Health plan providers and plan sponsors can use mobile devices to monitor and engage participants with notifications, such as medication reminders, when it is most convenient for them. Backsliders know where they are failing through self-monitoring in real time and coaches monitoring their results can intervene when necessary.
“People need to be thinking about lifestyle choices when they're living life. People don't live their life at a desk," says David Bjork, president of Telcare, Inc. He adds that lifestyle changes occur in the "between" moments, such as before and after work, during lunch or at home. Disease management programs and outreach need to encourage healthy behavior at all times.
Bjork insists that the current disease management strategy and methodology need to evolve; most of today’s programs identify people who are most expensive in claims data last year and manages them in order to save money for the future. However, he says, employers need to look at diseases from the wide mouth of the funnel and help people earlier before they escalate into high-risk categories and become high health plan utilizers.
Mobile technology is no different, says Bjork. Mobile outreach is deployed to focus on the most expensive, high-risk patients in a population. New solutions have emerged that collect data from more patients and track a wide range of peoples’ activity, biometric data or clinical metrics. And he believes more will come.
“The problem is that disease management as we know it has failed,” said Jonathan C. Javitt, MD, CEO and chief medical officer at Telcare, Inc. during a presentation at the Care Continuum Alliance Forum in Scottsdale, Ariz. These antiquated outreach programs too often identify the high-cost individuals from last year without taking into account who will be high cost this year or the year after that. He believes mobile solves this problem by engaging everyone in a population and can monitor and intervene with people in real-time before they become high risk.
Bjork agrees that tier-models focusing on certain diagnosis groups with high levels of utilization are missing an opportunity because certain disease states or condition states are left completely unguarded. For instance, disease management programs that focus on diabetes should also target obesity since that often leads to diabetes.
Mobile solutions for diabetes allow individuals to manage their blood sugar levels by sharing blood glucose levels through the cloud to the care management coach or vendor can monitor their levels behind the scenes. Mobile outreach can help manage pre-diabetes and weight as well by tracking a participant’s activity.
Carolina Advanced Health uses an online database to collect participant metrics and monitor them in a team-based approach with nutrition experts, care managers and pharmacists through disease registries. Participants self-collect their glucose levels through a mobile platform, which sends the data to health professionals. If the care team notices a blip in blood glucose levels after lunchtime, a nutritionist can call the patient immediately and ask them about their activity and meals that day to determine what caused the increase. The system educates the patient while monitoring their health metrics in real-time.
Self-management can get good results, explained Thomas Warcup, medical director at Carolina Advanced Health, but “when you add a team you get greater results because you’re watching the data on a real-time basis.”
Bjork believes mobile outreach like this is just the beginning. He predicts the mobile outreach for diabetes will fan out to managing other diseases. For example, blood pressure levels, asthma, and weight will all be observed in a more mobile way.
"We will start having methodologies for monitoring people in their own settings to manage behavior and intervene early on and not wait for the first episode to occur," he says.
One smart-tech inhaler gathers data whenever a patient uses it, helping understand what triggers an asthma attack and how to avoid one. Propeller Health’s inhaler shows when and where the patient uses it and combines this data with weather information (such as wind and UV index) as well as traffic information. With this data, they can map a city for an asthmatic patient so they can avoid bad air locations and prevent potential asthma attacks.
Make Tax Day Also Enrollment Deadline, One Health Expert Says
Originally posted November 7, 2013 by Julie Appleby on kaiserhealthnews.org
With one small fix, the administration could satisfy calls from some members of Congress to extend the time people have to enroll in new health insurance through online marketplaces, a health policy expert says.
The fix would not create problems in the industry and would move the deadline to a point when many people have a little extra money, says Brian Haile, senior vice president for health policy at tax preparation firm Jackson Hewitt.
Haile says pushing the current March 31 deadline to April 15 would ensure more people have cash from tax refunds to buy insurance – and would not really change the effective date of coverage beyond the current deadline.
That’s because there is a mid-month cutoff for coverage to begin on the first day of the following month. Policies for those who sign up at the end of March or on tax day would be the same: May 1.
While no specific new open enrollment end date has been proposed by lawmakers, several members of Congress of both parties are considering legislation amid the ongoing difficulties with healthcare.gov, the federal insurance website operating in 36 states.
Insurers are generally opposed to an extension, saying they based their premium rates for next year on the idea that the enrollment period would end March 31. Delaying the penalty for not having coverage or extending the open enrollment period could result in higher premiums in the future, the industry’s trade lobby has warned.
Actuaries say that insurers assumed in their premium calculations that most people would sign up by mid-December for coverage to begin Jan. 1, granting them an entire year of premium revenue.
Insurers also are concerned that the problem-plagued federal healthcare.gov website has increased chances that the people who soldier through the hassles of enrolling are likely to be those with costly medical conditions who were shut out of coverage previously. Healthy customers are needed to balance the risk – and cost — in the insurance pool. Add to that the talk of extending enrollment deadlines, and insurers see more revenue slipping away, eaten up by medical inflation and fewer months to collect premium payments during the year.
Looking at expected medical inflation for next year, every month’s delay probably corresponds to an average of two-thirds of 1 percent higher cost for the insurers, said David Axene, fellow of the Society of Actuaries. “That starts to creep into the amount of margin built into rates.”
Haile, a former director of the Insurance Exchange Planning Initiative of Tennessee, argues that granting a short enrollment extension could help insurers pick up additional younger or healthier consumers. Some of those customers may have been sitting on the sidelines because they are strapped for extra cash until they get their tax returns.
Insurers “are not going to lose revenue, but will pick up some young invincibles,” Haile said.
Although federal officials are not talking about changing the enrollment period – they see getting the website fixed as the top priority — the administration has moved to resolve an issue about timing. The problem was that even though the law allows the enrollment season to continue until the end of March, anyone purchasing a policy after Feb. 15 would have faced a penalty. So the administration granted an extra six weeks for people to avoid a penalty in 2014 for not having coverage. The tax penalty is $95 or 1 percent of household income, whichever is greater.
Why employers need to pay attention to ACA's insurance exchanges
Originally posted November 06, 2013 by Al Karr on www.federaltimes.com
When the Affordable Care Act first passed, most self-insured employers thought they wouldn't need to pay much attention to the new health insurance exchanges (or marketplaces) created by the law. After all, they were intended to help uninsured people get access to insurance, and their employees were obviously insured. And President Obama did promise that if people liked their employer coverage, they would get to keep it. So there wasn't really anything for self-insured employers to worry about, right?
Well, it turns out that things aren't that simple. Employers do need to pay attention to the exchanges that have launched in their states — either by the state or the federal government — because even if their employees don't use them, the functioning of the exchanges depends pretty heavily on some critical interactions among exchanges, employers, and their employees.
Most employers are aware by now that the requirement for large employers to offer coverage has been delayed for one year. But there are still many provisions in the ACA that place burdens and obligations on employers related to the exchanges. Most importantly, all employers (regardless of whether they currently offer insurance) must still provide notification to their employees describing the exchanges, and explaining the implications of applying for a tax credit on the exchange. There are also regulatory processes for exchanges to verify with employers information that individuals provide on exchange enrollment applications.
So employers are starting to realize that they really do need a communications strategy for how to tackle exchange education with their employees. Simply mailing the required notification form to all employees and calling it a day won't cut it.
Confused employees
Employees are going to have questions — lots of them. Some have been following the health care reform discussion, and those that hadn't been following it probably are now, thanks to the major issues the federal exchange has been having since its launch on October 1. Employees are seeing TV ads, print ads in magazines and newspapers, in addition to the media coverage on the exchange launch. And policy experts have noticed that some of these advertisements are totally devoid of any mention that the exchange is Obamacare or the ACA, and most don't mention anything at all about the individual mandate and that the exchanges are how to fulfill the mandate.
Employees could come into contact with navigators, certified application counselors, or in-person assisters (individuals hired by exchanges to assist with enrollment), all of which will be emphasizing the exchanges and the individual mandate, but probably don't know much about employer-sponsored plans in general, let alone each individual's circumstances regarding employer-sponsored coverage.
Recent polls have shown that as many as half of Americans believe the ACA was either repealed, or held unconstitutional, so these messages will no doubt be confusing for employees to hear. Despite all of the media coverage of the disastrous exchange launch, there are still people out there who might know about exchanges, but don't know what the ACA means to them.
Employers should be taking action now to devise a communications strategy aimed at their employees that is relevant to their workforces and fits appropriately within their company cultures. We all know that employees don't read the volumes of (boring) information employers provide during open enrollment season. Educating employees about exchanges is going to require a different and more ongoing approach. Some of the tactics employers should consider include:
- Human resources staff should be meeting with executive leadership to devise and invest in an employee communications strategy
- Contracting with a call center to do outbound calling to every employee
- Requiring all employees to meet face-to-face with an HR staff member
- Producing short videos about the exchanges for use in company communications
- Requiring attendance at "all staff" meetings
- Creating one-pagers to post on company intranet sites or to distribute through company newsletters
Navigators
One thing that has been discussed by some employers, but that may not be the best thing to rely on as a sole tactic, are the navigators. While a lot of organizations have become navigators, there is general agreement among policy makers that the program itself is woefully underfunded. And since some exchanges are run by states themselves, and the federal government runs others, it’s anticipated that the number of navigators hired and the training they will receive will vary from state to state. Also, there is no statutory requirement that navigators be trained on the nuances of employer-sponsored coverage, so there is no guarantee that they will be able to answer employees' questions about the coverage they are offered at work.
How Employers Can Prepare for PPACA Compliance in 2014
Where has 2013 gone?
Has 2013 left you with questions about Benefit Reform, Human Resources, Retirement Reform or what's coming in 2014? Don't worry! We have an expert from each department to answer your questions. See how talking with our experts can give you the insight you need during health care reform.
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When we say experts, we mean EXPERTS
Jamie Charlton and Frank Lopez were on a recent episode of Business Talk. Watch the video now to hear what they had to say about Health Care Reform, how it will effect you, and what employers need to know moving forward.
Speakers
Jamie Charlton, CFP
Is it time to offer your employees more?
Show your employees that their company understands the impact this payroll tax change has had at home and that you are there to help them by offering a Financial Wellness Workshop.
We will come on-site to conduct a Lunch & Learn.
2014 Annual Benefit Plan Amounts
Originally posted on www.shrm.org The Internal Revenue Service announced on Oct. 31, 2013, cost-of-living adjustments for tax year 2014, also charted here and here, that apply to dollar limits for 401(k) and other defined contribution retirement plans and for defined benefit pension plans. Some plan limits will remain unchanged because the increase in the Consumer Price Index did not meet the statutory thresholds for their adjustment, while other limits will rise in 2014.
The announcement highlighted the following:
- 401(k), 403(b) and profit-sharing plan elective deferrals in 2014 will remain at $17,500; the catch-up contribution limit will stay at $5,500.
- The annual defined contribution limit from all sources will rise to $52,000 from $51,000.
- The amount of employee compensation that can be considered in calculating contributions to defined contribution plans will increase to$260,000 from $255,000.
- The limit used in the definition of a highly compensated employee for the purpose of 401(k) nondiscrimination testing remains unchanged at$115,000.
| Defined Contribution Plan Limits For 401(k), 403(b) and most 457 plans, the COLA increases for dollar limits on benefits and contributions are as follows: |
2014 |
2013 |
| Maximum elective deferral by employee |
$17,500 |
$17,500 |
| Catch-up contribution (age 50 and older during 2012) |
$5,500 |
$5,500 |
| Defined contribution maximum deferral (employer and employee combined) |
$52,000 |
$51,000 |
| Employee annual compensation limit for calculating contributions |
$260,000 |
$255,000 |
| Annual compensation of “key employees” in a top-heavy plan |
$170,000 |
$165,000 |
| Annual compensation of “highly compensated employee” in a top-heavy plan (“HCE threshold”) |
$115,000 |
$115,000 |
“A $1,000 increase to the overall defined contribution limit will allow participants to potentially get a little more ‘bang’ out of their plan—at least if their employer wants to give them more money,” noted retirement-planning firm Van Iwaarden Associates in an online commentary on the 2014 changes. Defined Benefit Plans
- The maximum annual benefit that may be funded through a defined benefit plan will increase to $210,000 from $205,000.
- For a participant who separated from service before Jan. 1, 2014,the limit for defined benefit plans is computed by multiplying the participant’s compensation limit, as adjusted through 2013, by 1.0155.
“The primary consequence of this change is that individuals who have very large DB benefits (say, shareholders in a professional firm cash balance plan) could see a deduction increase if their benefits were previously constrained by the [Internal Revenue Code Section 415] dollar limit,” the Van Iwaarden posting explained. Other Workplace Retirement Plan Limits
- For SIMPLE (savings incentive match plan for employees of small employers) retirement accounts, the maximum contribution limit will remain $12,000; the catch-up contribution limit will also stay the same, at$2,500.
- For simplified employee pensions (SEPs), the minimum compensation amount will remain $550, while the maximum compensation limit will jump to $260,000 from $255,000.
- In an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP), the maximum account balance in the plan subject to a five-year distribution period will rise to$1,050,000 from $1,035,000, while the dollar amount used to determine the lengthening of the five-year distribution period will increase to$210,000 from $205,000.
| Non-401(k) Workplace Retirement Plan Limits |
2014 |
2013 |
| SIMPLE employee deferrals |
$12,000 |
$12,000 |
| SIMPLE catch-up deferrals |
$2,500 |
$2,500 |
| SEP minimum compensation |
$550 |
$550 |
| SEP annual compensation limit |
$260,000 |
$255,000 |
| Social Security wage base |
$117,000 |
$113,700 |
Individual Retirement Accounts
- The limit on annual contributions to an individual retirement account (IRA) will stay at $5,500. The additional catch-up contribution limit for those ages 50 and over will remain $1,000.
- The deduction for taxpayers making contributions to a traditional IRA has been phased out for singles and heads of household who are covered by a workplace retirement plan and have modified adjusted gross incomes (AGIs) from $60,000 to $70,000, up from $59,000 to $69,000 in 2013.
- For married couples filing jointly, in which the spouse who makes the IRA contribution is covered by a workplace retirement plan, the AGI phase-out range will be $96,000 to $116,000, up from $95,000 to $115,000.
- For an IRA contributor who is not covered by a workplace retirement plan and is married to someone who is covered, the deduction has been phased out for couples with an AGI from $181,000 to $191,000, up from $178,000 to $188,000.
- For a married individual filing a separate return who is covered by a workplace retirement plan, the phase-out range is not subject to an annual cost-of-living adjustment and will remain $0 to $10,000.
- For a Roth IRA, the AGI phase-out range for taxpayers making contributions will be $181,000 to $191,000 for married couples filing jointly, up from $178,000 to $188,000 in 2013. For singles and heads of household, the income phase-out range will be $114,000 to $129,000, up from $112,000 to $127,000. For a married individual filing a separate return who is covered by a retirement plan at work, the phase-out range will remain $0 to $10,000.
- The AGI limit for the saver’s credit (also known as the retirement savings contributions credit) for low- and moderate-income workers will rise to $60,000 for married couples filing jointly, up from $59,500 in 2013;$45,050 for heads of household, up from $44,250; and $30,000 for singles and married couples filing separately, up from $29,500.
Contribution Misperceptions Hinder Savings Employees often have a skewed perception of retirement plan contribution limits. According to Mercer Workplace Survey results, the average participant believes that the tax-deferral limit is only $8,532, just under half the actual 2013 limit of $17,500. Looking at intended savings rates, most appear close to the perceived limit but are still far off from the actual. For those nearing retirement (age 50-plus), the perception gap is even bigger. The survey represents a national cross section of active 401(k) participants; online interviews were completed with 1,506 respondents between May 28 and June 5, 2013.
|
By Age: Actual Contribution vs. Perceived Contribution Limit (Average $) Respondents were asked, “As far as you know, what is the maximum dollar amount you can defer from income taxes this year by contributing it to a 401(k)?,” and “Not counting any contributions your employer may make to your 401(k) plan over the next 12 months, how much money, if any, do you expect to put into your 401(k) plan?” (click on chart to view enlargement) Source: Mercer Workplace Survey, 2013. |
“This data not only points to a troubling disconnect between perception and reality but also points to a false sense of security among 401(k) participants,” according to Mercer’s analysts. “It also begs the question whether participants are leaving some tax efficiency—knowingly or unknowingly—on the table.”
Thirty-four percent said they would increase their 401(k) contribution to the tax-deferred maximum “if they could live the last 12 months over again,” the survey found, which highlights the value of effectively communicating maximum contribution limits to employees and conveying how even small annual contribution increases can substantially boost the size of their retirement nest egg.
More mid-market employers eligible for group voluntary benefits plans
Originally posted November 03, 2013 by Joanne Wojcik on www.businessinsurance.com
Many mid-market employers that previously could offer voluntary products to employees only on an individual or multi-life basis may now be eligible for group plans.
Perhaps the only exception is long-term care insurance, which is available primarily on an individual basis due to the recent spate of insurer withdrawals from the group LTC market.
“Now many insurers are offering voluntary benefit products on a group basis to make it possible to enroll on self-serve platforms,” said Bruce Sletton, senior vice president and national elective benefits practice leader at Aon Hewitt in Dallas.
“The trend has been toward group insurance products in the voluntary space,” said Beth Grellner, St. Louis-based co-chair of Towers Watson & Co.'s national voluntary benefits and services group. “For the third year in a row, we've seen group insurance (voluntary benefits) grow at a faster rate than voluntary products offered on an individual basis.”
Group voluntary benefits provide guaranteed issue, regardless of employees' health status or age, and often come at a lower price than if the benefits been underwritten on an individual basis.
The downside, however, is that group products are guaranteed to be renewable only on a one-, two- or three-year basis, Mr. Sletton said. “The insurer has the right to review the products and then make price adjustments,” or drop the group altogether, he said.
Senate approves workplace gay rights bill
Originally posted November 7, 2013 by Susan Davis on www.usatoday.com
The U.S. Senate approved, 64-32, a historic gay rights bill to ban workplace discrimination based on sexual preference or gender identity.
"It is time for Congress to pass a federal law that ensures all our citizens, regardless of where they live, can go to work unafraid to be who they are," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.
Fifty-four Democrats and 10 Republicans supported the legislation.
Religious organizations and the U.S. military are exempt under the Employer Non-Discrimination Act, a stipulation that helped win GOP support. The bill applies to work sites with more than 15 people.
ENDA has been introduced in nearly every Congress since 1994. It came one vote shy of passage in 1996, but had not been given a full Senate vote since.
Existing federal laws ban employer discrimination based on race, color, sex, nationality, religion, age and disability.
The legislation is hitting a wall in the GOP-controlled House, where Speaker John Boehner's office said he does not plan to allow a vote. Boehner opposes the legislation because he says it will cost small-business jobs and increasing "frivolous" litigation.
In a statement, President Obama urged House leaders to bring it up for a vote. "One party in one house of Congress should not stand in the way of millions of Americans who want to go to work each day and simply be judged by the job they do," he said.
Opponents contend that the legislation is unnecessary because most private businesses, including the vast majority of Fortune 500 companies, have self-adopted policies that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.
Twenty-two states and Washington, D.C., have already enacted laws prohibiting such discrimination.
A June 2013 Pew Research survey of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender adults reported 21% who said they have been treated unfairly at work because of their orientation.