Washington After three months of turmoil surrounding the rollout of President Obamas health care plan, the country faces a historic turning point on Jan. 1.

From emergency rooms to pharmacies to company human resources departments, changes will unfold within the U.S. health-care system as the nation guarantees insurance coverage to all Americans for the first time, a goal that has eluded presidents and lawmakers since the end of World War II.

Beginning with the New Year, insurance companies can no longer refuse to cover people because of sickness, charge them more than healthy customers or drop them when they fall ill. In return, most Americans are required to have a health plan. Some of the 19 million Americans who buy insurance on their own will find their new plans are more expensive with fewer treatment options than before as insurers seek to contain costs.

Millions of people will now be covered for the first time. Benefits will be expanded, Robert Zirkelbach, a spokesman for Americas Health Insurance Plans, the insurance industrys Washington lobby group, said in a phone interview. But these new benefits bring new costs.

About 1.1 million people selected health plans in time to have coverage in January using the federal enrollment system, which covers 36 states including Texas, Florida and Illinois, the Obama administration said Sunday. The government didnt say how many people paid for their plans, the final step to complete their enrollment.

Hospitals and doctors have been preparing for the insurance expansion promised by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act since its passage in 2010 by merging into larger institutions and redesigning the way they deliver care to take advantage of incentives in the law. The government has designated about 360 medical systems as accountable care organizations, entitling them to a share of any savings they can produce by streamlining care for patients in Medicare, the U.S. health program for the elderly.

Better coordination for elderly patients, the government hopes, will translate to a more efficient health system for all Americans as insurance coverage expands. That proposition is about to be put to the test.

Beginning Jan. 1, the law bars insurers from rejecting consumers who are sick or charging them more. In fact, companies will no longer ask about prospective customers health beyond the question of whether they smoke. It will be illegal for insurers to impose annual dollar limits on care, and they must cover a standard set of benefits nationwide.

People who are entering the market for the first time also will gain benefits required since 2010, including access to many preventive services without any out-of-pocket expense and full coverage of costly procedures such as colonoscopies and mammograms.

While the number of people initially affected by the expansion will be small, the law promises that Americans no longer need to fear losing health coverage should they leave their jobs.

Read the original post:

Test of Historic Health Care Law Begins on Jan. 1