Insurance Groups to Tout Projected Premium Increases, Oppose Health Bill

After playing an integral role in shaping the health-care reform effort in Congress, leading members of the health insurance industry plan to oppose the legislation, warning that the average family premium could increase up to $4,000 over the next decade, according to the Washington Post. They plan to circulate a report paid for by America's Health Insurance Plans, a health insurance trade group, that shows the rising costs of family premiums under the Obama administration's proposed health care reforms.

The report's release will come one day before a crucial Senate Finance Committee vote on one version of the health care bill, a strategic move that elicited a sharp response from the White House and the committee itself. An administration official told Politico that insurance industry officials had not warned them of the report, and felt "betrayed" by the opposition from the same groups that have supported reform efforts. Finance Committee spokesman Scott Mulhauser blasted the report as a "health insurance company hack job, plain and simple."

"This report is untrue, disingenuous and bought and paid for by the same health insurance companies that have been gouging too many consumers for too long as they stand in the way of reform yet again," Mulhauser said in an e-mailed statement. "Now that health care reform grows ever closer, these health insurers are breaking out the same, tired playbook of deception to prevent millions of Americans from getting the affordable, accessible care they need.

Though the report's findings are debatable and come from a group with entrenched interests in the health care industry, it is certain to fuel Republican opposition to the legislation and could kill the momentum the White House felt had coalesced behind the effort. The Post said that, at very least, it is "certain to raise questions about whether Obama can deliver on his twin promises of extending coverage to millions of uninsured Americans while also curbing skyrocketing health-care costs."