5 big changes Trump made to the ACA

More than two years after President Donald Trump signed an executive order allowing administration officials to defer and waive implementation of ACA regulations, the administration has continued to chip away at the health law.

Below are five of the biggest changes the Trump administration has made to the ACA, according to NPR:

1. Elimination of the ACA's individual mandate. In 2018, the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation predicted there would be 3 million fewer Americans with health insurance in 2019 due to the elimination.

2. State Medicaid work requirements encouraged. New data shows five states that received approval to implement Medicaid work requirements paid more than $408 million to administer the change, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office.

3. Insurers' cost-sharing reduction subsidies axed. In October 2017, President Trump said his administration would immediately end cost-sharing reduction subsidies to payers. The cost-sharing reductions helped offset the cost of providing health insurance to low-income Americans on the exchanges.

4. More people can buy short-term health plans. Short-term health plans, once largely banned by the ACA, have expanded under the Trump administration and brought with them familiar stories of patients being denied coverage because of preexisting conditions. The Trump administration has argued the rule will help increase Americans' health insurance options, especially for those facing high premiums and fewer plan options in the ACA individual market.

5. HealthCare.gov, where people sign up for coverage, lost funding. In 2017, HHS announced it would cut the ACA's advertising budget by 90 percent in 2018, reducing allocated funds to $10 million.

Read the full NPR article here.

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