July 7, 2010 Fired after May 31 this year? You won't qualify for the signficant COBRA subsidy provided by the  American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) even though you are probably eligible for COBRA due to the inaction of congress,  allowing the COBRA Premium subsidy to sunset. Americans who qualified on or before May 31, 2010 may continue to pay reduced premiums for up to 15 months, as long as they are not eligible for another group health plan or Medicare.

Unless the sunset date is extended by Congress, individuals who lose their jobs after May 31, 2010 will not be eligible for the subsidy. According to a statement released today by the Department of Labor.

Through the subsidy, eligible individuals pay only 35 percent of their COBRA premiums and the remaining 65 percent is reimbursed to the coverage provider through a tax credit.

UPDATED 20 July, 2010 - HuffPost: As the Senate debates a bill to reauthorize expired domestic aid programs, including a provision to extend jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed, Sens. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) have introduced an amendment that would add COBRA back into the extenders bill.

The amendment failed and the COBRA subsidy did not make it back into HR4213 that passed the SENATE today.

"Millions of Americans have been hard hit by the recession and lost their jobs through no fault of their own," said Senator Casey in a statement Wednesday. "Unfortunately, some people in Washington want to pull up the ladder and take away help for these struggling families. Not extending COBRA premium assistance will hurt hundreds of thousands of people in Pennsylvania and across the country and it will add further strain on our recovering economy."

Fifteen percent of all unemployment insurance recipients rely on the reduced insurance premiums offered by COBRA, the program that allows workers to continue buying their employer-provided health coverage after they've been laid off.

Without the 65 percent subsidy created by the stimulus, COBRA is too expensive for many: Family premiums for COBRA coverage average $1,107 a month for unemployed families without subsidy--that's 84.3 percent of their monthly unemployment insurance checks.

Unless the law is changed, any worker laid off after June 1 will not be eligible for COBRA subsidies, though workers laid off earlier will continue receiving the subsidy.

Extending COBRA will cost $8 billion, but Casey, who led the last effort to extend benefits , is unfazed. "It's an emergency and when you're in an emergency you use emergency spending," he said in a conference call with progressive media Wednesday. "My amendment will make sure that we have eligibility for COBRA extended through November. To do otherwise would be a terrible mistake for real people, for real families, and a terrible mistake for our economy."

The amendment was introduced just a day after President Obama pressed Congress to extend COBRA subsidies in a statement during a town hall question and answer session. The President suggested that while not a long-term solution, COBRA subsidies are necessary since the major provisions of health care reform have yet to kicked in.

A letter from Casey and Brown sent Wednesday to Majority Leader Harry Reid and Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus calls for support for adding COBRA to the extenders bill though November of 2010. HuffPost

UPDATED July 14, 2010 Americans involuntary terminated after May 31, 2010 who would be eligible for COBRA health insurance will NOT be eligible the CORA subsidy under the The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), as amended as amended several times. According to this statement by Assistant Secretary of Labor Phyllis C. Borzi:

Eligible individuals pay only 35 percent of their COBRA premiums and the remaining 65 percent is reimbursed to the coverage provider through a tax credit.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) October 25, 2009 “ The United States' healthcare system wastes between $505 billion and $850 billion every year, according to a Thomson Reuters report released on Monday. Yes thats BILLION, a third of the US' annual healthcare spending.

"America's healthcare system is indeed hemorrhaging billions of dollars, and the opportunities to slow the fiscal bleeding are substantial," the report reads.

"The bad news is that an estimated $700 billion is wasted annually. That's one-third of the nation's healthcare bill," Robert Kelley, vice president of healthcare analytics at Thomson Reuters said in a statement.

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