Oklahoma native leads effort to boost health insurance enrollment
Lori Lodes has got a simple message for Oklahomans: there’s a good chance you can afford health insurance, but you need to act now.
Lodes now lives in Washington, D.C., but she returned home to Oklahoma City for Thanksgiving. She co-founded Get America Covered, an organization promoting information about the health insurance exchange through social media and advertising. She previously worked for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services under former President Barack Obama.
The interview has been lightly edited for length.
Q: Could you describe the work you’re doing with Get America Covered and why you felt that was something that needed to be done?
A: We started Get America Covered back in October to really help get more people signed up for health insurance, or people re-enrolled if they currently have coverage. … What we’re trying to do is to really get the information out to people, to get the facts out to people, so they can make the decision that’s right for them. … We’ve done some polling earlier this year, and it showed that people are really confused. … They don’t know that the deadline is Dec. 15. They don’t know that financial help is available.
Q: You mentioned that this year is different from previous years because of the shorter enrollment period. Is there anything else that’s happening differently this year?
A: This year, the Trump administration … cut the outreach and education budget by about 90 percent . ... If there isn’t the education done, there are going to be fewer younger and healthier people signing up for health coverage. … But there’s also another important difference between last year and this year that people might not know: … because of changes that the Trump administration made, health care premiums went up a lot. At the same time, because premiums went up, the financial help to pay for your coverage increased as well, for most people. … There’s a really good chance you’ll be able to find a really good plan that saves you a lot of money compared to last year.
Q: You worked for CMS on implementing the Affordable Care Act and also have been active in Democratic politics, so why should a person who has a different ideological bent be concerned about this issue?
A: I think that, regardless of whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, at the end of the day, health care is a very personal decision. … And we know, based on a lot of research, that when people are thinking about health care and signing up for health care, politics really doesn’t come into it. They’re thinking about: Can I afford it? Is my doctor covered? Are my prescriptions covered? … It’s one of those issues that is so politically charged and has been for so long. But at the end of the day, when you’re making a decision about your health care, it shouldn’t come down to politics. It should really come down to what is the best decision for you and your family’s health, for you and your family’s budget.