What Does a Biden Presidency Mean for Healthcare?

Late night Twitter scrolling. Feels like my consumption has risen exponentially this past year. Anyone else?

But a series of tweets (and linked articles published on KFF.org and JAMA Network) from Kaiser Family Foundation’s Executive VP for Health Policy Larry Levitt recently caught my attention. In them, he shares predictions for Biden’s post-inauguration impacts on healthcare.

Of course, Biden is tackling COVID response as priority number one. As of inauguration morning (when I’m penning this blog), we’re already seeing talks of a coming executive order mandating that masks be worn on Federal properties.

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Levitt expects many more executive actions, suggesting that by the time the Biden Administration and courts are finished, there “may not be a whole lot left of the Trump Administration’s efforts in health care policy.”

Levitt suggests the following potential Biden actions that will impact healthcare:

COVID Response

• Put scientists front and public health experts front and center
• Send a clear message on masks
• Provide a bigger federal role in vaccination
• Reenter the World Health Organization

Actions on ACA and Medicaid

• Reopen ACA enrollment and restore massive cuts to outreach and navigators
• Restrict enrollment in short-term plans not required to cover preexisting conditions
• Prohibit Medicaid work requirements and “block grants”

Health Care for Immigrants

• Repeal expansion of the public charge rule that penalized people for being sick or low income, or for using public health benefits.
• Reverse a proclamation requiring immigrants to have private health insurance.

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While our healthcare team is continuously tuning into industry trends and the governmental mandates that help shape them, these early days of a Biden presidency feel all the more prescient and revelatory of what’s to come. This changing of the guard marks clear shifts in policy that will shape how our healthcare system delivers care and how we, as healthcare consumers, engage in our own healthcare journey.

I, like many others, am watching intently.