In an election year move, the Cuomo administration slashed the rate increase requests sought by insurers selling ObamaCare policies by nearly two-thirds.
The Department of Financial Services granted an 8.6 percent average rate hike for individual policies in 2019, when the insurers said they needed 24 percent.
It was the largest reduction since New York’s ObamaCare markets were set up five years ago.
There are 330,000 New Yorkers who get their medical insurance in the individual market.
Regulators also chopped the increase sought in the small group insurance market from 7.5 percent to 3.8 percent.
Earlier this year, health insurers blamed President Trump and Congress’ decision to repeal the individual mandate — meaning people would not be penalized for going without insurance — as a major factor in higher costs.
Insurers warned that younger and healthier people would bail out, leaving them to cover the older and sicker.
Cuomo, who is seeking re-election to a third term, telegraphed that he wanted his regulators to pare down the rate requests, saying, “If we allowed that rate increase to go through, it would be hundreds of millions of dollars as a bonanza to the private insurance companies….We’re not going to allow it to happen.
Still, many individual policy holders will see double-digit increases.
For example, rates for Emblem Health subscribers will jump 17 percent. The insurer sought a 31 percent hike.
Premiums at Fidelis — which represents nearly a third of the individual market — are set to climb 13.7 percent. Fidelis requested a 38.6 percent hike.
Customers with NYC MetroPlus,, which partners with the city’s public hospitals, will see 13. 5 percent hike.
Premiums for Oscar health insurance policies go up 11 percent, less than half the 25 percent increase sought.
Maria Vullo, head of the financial services agency said it would not “allow the federal government’s wrongful repeal of the individual mandate penalty to become a self-fulfilling prophecy to make health insurance unaffordable in New York.”
She emphasized that rates for individuals are still 55 percent lower than before the Affordable Care Act was enacted.
The health insurers industry representative said the state’s rejection of most of the requested rate increases smacked of election-year politics.
“Rising health care costs remain a challenge for New Yorkers, but the rate review process should be free from political considerations, focused on economics and actuarial data. We are concerned about the impact the rate reductions will have on the stability of the marketplace and may necessitate higher increases in future years,” said Eric Linzer, president and CEO of the New York Health Plan Association.
