Health Care Assurance Act of 2004
Latest action · Jun 23, 2004 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.
Progress
Where this bill reached, and when. A stage with no date was not reached; one that failed a vote and later carried shows the date it carried.
- IntroducedJun 23, 2004
- Passed SenateNot reached
- Passed HouseNot reached
- To the PresidentNot reached
- Became lawNot reached
Summary
Health Care Assurance Act of 2004 - Amends the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) and the Public Health Service Act to: (1) develop a target actuarial value for standard health care coverage offered by any plan or group or individual health insurance coverage; (2) specify how premiums for health care coverage are to be set; and (3) require health plans and issuers to disclose rating practices.
Sets forth provisions governing the operation (including premium setting and enrollment) of qualified small employer purchasing groups, qualified association plans, church plans, multi-employer plans, plans maintained by rural electric cooperatives, and plans maintained by rural telephone cooperatives.
Requires small employers to offer, but not contribute to, standard health care coverage.
Amends the Internal Revenue Code to impose taxes on the failure of specified health insurance plans to comply with this Act.
Sets forth provisions regarding "continuation coverage" (COBRA), including regarding deductibles, terminating coverage, length of coverage, and coverage of dependent children.
Amends title XXI (State Children's Health Insurance) (SCHIP) of the Social Security Act (SSA) to: (1) revise the definition of an eligible ''low-income child'' to mean a child whose family income is at or below 233 percent (currently, 200 percent) of the poverty line; and (2) authorize States to extend SCHIP coverage to include health care assistance for low-income parents and pregnant women.
Increases the authorized appropriations for the Account for Medicare Integrity Program.
Requires the Secretary to provide for reporting systems, training, education, and a national database to reduce medical errors.
Establishes the Trust Fund for Medical Treatment Outcomes Research to be funded using taxes related to health insurance policies.
Sets forth provisions regarding information technology, including regarding how the use of such technology can be encouraged.
Requires the Secretary to educate the public about health care choices and to develop ways to improve advance directives and living wills.
Amends the title XVIII (Medicare) of the SSA to increase the reimbursement rate for physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and clinical nurse specialists.
Requires the Secretary to establish programs to recruit high school or college students to careers in general medicine.
Cosponsors 1
Members who signed on, in the order they did. All signed on Jun 23, 2004.
| Seat | Cosponsor | Signed on | |
|---|---|---|---|
| D-IA | Tom Harkin | Original | Jun 23, 2004 |
Committees 1
Where it was sent and what each committee and subcommittee did with it, in order.
| Chamber | Committee | What it did |
|---|---|---|
| Senate | Finance Committee | Referred Jun 23, 2004 |
Actions 3
Everything that happened, newest first.
- Jun 23, 2004Introduced in Senate
- Jun 23, 2004Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.
- Jun 22, 2004Sponsor introductory remarks on measure. (mislabeled in CR as S.2558: CR S7183-7189)
Titles 2
Every title it has carried, official and short, at each stage.
- Official Title as Introduced
- A bill entitled "The Health Care Assurance Act of 2004".
- Short Titles as Introduced
- Health Care Assurance Act of 2004
Subjects
Assigned by the Library of Congress. Policy area: Health.
- Administrative fees
- Administrative procedure
- Agricultural labor
- Agriculture and Food
- Anesthetics
- Appropriations
- Associations, institutions, etc.
- Business records
- Career education
- Chambers of commerce
- Child health
- Churches
- Civil Rights and Liberties, Minority Issues
- Clergy
- Coinsurance
- Commerce
- Communication in medicine
- Community and school
- Computers
- Congress
- Congressional reporting requirements
- Consumer education
- Continuing education
- Cooperative societies
- Curricula
- Data banks
- Department of Health and Human Services
- Discrimination in insurance
- Discrimination in medical care
- Economics and Public Finance
- Education
- Electronic data interchange
- Elementary and secondary education
- Emergency Management
- Emergency medicine
- Employee health benefits
- Excise tax
- Families
- Federal aid to child health services
- Federal aid to education
- Federal aid to health facilities
- Federal aid to research
- Finance and Financial Sector
- Government Operations and Politics
- Government paperwork
- Government publicity
- Government trust funds
- Grants-in-aid
- Health
- Health care fraud
- Health education
- Health information systems
- Health insurance
- Health insurance continuation
- Health insurance portability
- Health promotion
- Higher education
- Hospital personnel
- Immigrant health
- Immigrants
- Immigration
- Information technology
- Insurance premiums
- Labor and Employment
- Law
- Licenses
- Living wills
- Married people
- Maternal health services
- Mathematics
- Medicaid
- Medical economics
- Medical education
- Medical fees
- Medical malpractice
- Medical records
- Medical research
- Medical statistics
- Medical technology
- Medically uninsured
- Medicare
- Mentoring
- Migrant labor
- Nonprofit organizations
- Nurse practitioners
- Nurses
- Nutrition
- Parents
- Patients' rights
- Payroll deductions
- Physicians' assistants
- Poor children
- Pregnant women
- Preventive medicine
- Professional associations
- Public service advertising
- Quality of care
- Religion
- Research grants
- Science, Technology, Communications
- Scientific education
- Seasonal labor
- Secondary education
- Self-insurance
- Small business
- Social Welfare
- Standards
- State laws
- Tax penalties
- Taxation
- Trade associations
- Valuation
- Welfare eligibility
- Women
- Women's health
- Youth
Text 1
Each version as it was printed, newest first.
- Jun 23, 2004Introduced in Senate
Everything here is as published by Congress: the summary is the Congressional Research Service's, the action wording is the clerks', and the subjects are the Library of Congress's. How far it got is read from the actions themselves, taking the most recent one of each kind, so a bill that failed a vote and later passed is shown as having passed. Records come from this bill on Congress.gov and govinfo.gov; cost estimates are the Congressional Budget Office's, and the hearings are the printed hearings GovInfo publishes, which can appear months after the hearing.