Trump unveils healthcare plan without clear funding or execution timeline

Trump unveils healthcare plan without clear funding or execution timeline Trump’s healthcare plan promises lower costs but lacks specifics and faces challenges from a divided Congress. United States President Donald Trump announced a healthcare plan that would replace government subsidies for insurance with direct payments into health savings accounts for consumers, an idea that some experts have said would hurt lower-income Americans. The Trump administration on Thursday called on Congress to pass legislation to codify Trump’s most-favoured-nation drug price deals and to make more medicines available for over-the-counter purchase. Recommended Stories list of 4 items list 1 of 4 Musk denies knowledge of Grok producing sexualised images of minors list 2 of 4 Child rights org says Google undermines parental control of child accounts list 3 of 4 Canada’s Mark Carney seeks reset on pivotal trip to China list 4 of 4 Canada’s Carney hails improving ties with China “This will lower healthcare costs and increase consumer choice by strengthening price transparency, increasing competition, and reducing the need for costly and time-consuming doctor’s visits,” the White House said in a release outlining the order. Trump’s framework, dubbed “The Great Healthcare Plan” and outlined in a White House fact sheet, includes an insurance cost-sharing reduction programme that could reduce the most common Obamacare plan premiums by more than 10 percent and replaces government subsidies for insurance with direct payments to Americans. The White House did not provide details on how much money it planned to send to consumers to buy insurance, or whether the funds would be available to all “Obamacare” enrollees or only those with lower-tier bronze and catastrophic plans. The idea mirrors one floated among Republican senators last year. Democrats largely rejected it, saying the accounts would not be enough to cover costs for most consumers. Currently, such accounts are used disproportionately by the wealthiest Americans, who have more income to fund them and a bigger incentive to lower their tax rate. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked at her briefing on Thursday whether the president could guarantee that, under his plan, people would be able to cover their healthcare costs. “If this plan is put in place, every single American who has healthcare in the United States will see lower costs as a result,” she said without elaborating. “These are common-sense actions that make up President Trump’s great healthcare plan, and they represent the most comprehensive and bold agenda to lower healthcare costs to have ever been considered by the federal government,” Leavitt also said. The White House said that the plan would not affect people with pre-existing conditions. The plan also targets pharmacy benefit managers and requires insurance companies to disclose the profits they take from premiums and the frequency of denials. Companies would publish their rate and coverage comparisons on their websites in “plain English” as well as the percentage of revenues paid out to claims compared with overhead costs and profits. They would also be required to publish the percentage of claims they...

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