A look at Biden’s health care plans

As the inauguration draws near, eyes now turn to what President-elect Joe R. Biden plans to do about American health care.

According to his campaign website, Biden’s plans included building on and strengthening the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which is unsurprising considering his role in its passage during the Obama administration. He plans to expand coverage to an estimated 97 percent of the country by creating a public option similar to Medicare with a premium-free element for low-income Americans and increasing subsidies to offset health insurance costs.

The site also says that Biden will fight surprise billing, market concentration, and he will seek to lower costs and improve outcomes by accelerating the testing and deployment of new health care solutions and increasing wages for low-wage health care workers.

The Kaiser Family Foundation has reported that Biden’s plans seem to call for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to take an outsized role not seen since the Carter administration due to possible congressional inaction.

While much of what Biden will do is still in flux, it has been reported that he has a flurry of executive orders prepared for after the inauguration that could impact health care.

The New York Times reports that some of these executive orders are aimed at tackling the ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic that continues to kill a record number of Americans every day. These orders are reported to include:

• Naming Jeff Zients the government’s official COVID-19 response coordinator
• Imposing a national mask mandate in all federal facilities and among all federal employees
• Terminating efforts to leave the World Health Organization