Earlier today, Republican leaders in the U.S. Senate released a revised health care reform bill. The bill modifies the Better Care Reconciliation Act, which was the Senate’s earlier attempt at overturning the Affordable Care Act. See our prior article on the BCRA by clicking here. Senate leaders did not expect to garner enough votes to pass the BCRA as originally drafted, and hope to be able to gather support with the newly revised bill.
The modified bill, still referred to as the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017, continues to eliminate the individual mandate to maintain health coverage and the employer mandate to offer health coverage to full-time employees. The individual mandate and employer mandate are nullified by changing the penalties for failing to maintain/offer coverage to $0.
Differences from the prior version of the BCRA include:
It is still unclear if the revised bill will be able to gather enough support for passage. The Senate expects to hold a procedural vote on the measure next week.