What Affordable Care Act decision means for Central Coast

Over a million people have signed up for Covered California since it launched.

While the Supreme Court decision didn’t change much for us here, subsidies are rising in the state because of the increased enrollment.

“My first thought was, not surprised,” said Randy Pierson of Pierson and Associates Insurance. He’s also an Affordable Care Act trained expert.

He said the 6-to-3 decision to keep the ACA intact means little for California because the state is one of 16 that has its own insurance rollout.

“We got 85 percent of people in the state of California receiving subsidies,” Pierson said. “They keep increasing the number of people on the rolls, and we have a certain amount of money to pay for subsidies.”

The other issue is the lack of doctors. In Monterey County, a new clinic is set to open to help with that and accommodate the influx of patients.

Housed in Natividad Medical Center, Laurel Family Practice and Laurel Vista are the two new county health clinics.

“We are addressing two of the largest challenges faced by the nation right now, which is access to primary care and finding the physicians who can provide the primary care,” said Julie Edgcomb, Monterey County’s clinic services director.

Edgcomb said with the ability to train more primary care physicians and use state-of-the-art equipment, they can accommodate everyone, including the 130,000 county residents on Medi-cal.

The clinics are set to open July 1.

Pierson added that in 2016 the federal government is going stop providing federal subsidies in California.