Brian Iv works in a factory in Orange County, earning around $26 per hour. He suffers chronic pain from a lifetime of manual labor jobs and previous workplace injuries, but often treats the pain with home remedies or traditional Cambodian practices. Going to the doctor is too expensive, he said.
Iv recently got a raise and was able to purchase health insurance through his company, but for a long time he had a Covered California Silver Plan, a mid-tier plan under the state’s version of the federal Affordable Care Act marketplace. A visit to a primary care doctor cost nearly $50, and every time Iv picked up a prescription it was an additional $10 to $15. It was a lot for someone living paycheck-to-paycheck with little wiggle room in the budget.
“Right now, after COVID-19, everything is expensive,” Iv said. “Sometimes when you get sick you avoid that (expense). You have to keep the money to pay the rent, pay the bills, pay the car.”
Mid-tier health coverage like Iv’s Silver Plan is widely considered the best value for people who have insurance through Covered California. But in the past nine years, deductibles for the Silver Plan have grown nearly 88% after adjusting for inflation, increasing out-of-pocket costs for enrollees. In raw numbers, last year deductibles grew from $3,700 for an individual and $7,400 for a family with a Silver Plan to $4,750 and $9,500, respectively.
That’s why health care advocates are miffed that Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal would sweep away $333.4 million set aside a couple of years ago for the state to defray health care costs for middle-income residents, transferring the money to the general fund….
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