The No Surprises Act may have shielded patients from unexpected medical bills, but it’s left a bureaucratic mess, with providers and insurers fighting over who’ll cover the costs and Congress weighing whether to step back in, Axios reports.
Almost a year and a half after it was enacted, the law is tied up in multiple court cases as providers push to change the process it set up to resolve billing disputes. Cases in arbitration are piling up, with more than 164,000 disputes filed from April through early December 2022.
For now, all eyes are on the Biden administration, which twice tried to draft rules that providers say favored insurers and prompted lawsuits. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra acknowledged at a House Ways and Means hearing last month that the arbitration process has been swamped, with many more claims filed than originally estimated. Read more.
