Panel named to oversee health insurance exchange
Gov. Martin O’Malley made his picks for the board that will oversee the state’s new Health Benefit Exchange, where the uninsured will go to buy coverage under health care reform.
Consumers are supposed to be able to compare rates, benefits and quality among insurers. The state passed a law creating the exchange and its structure earlier this year. It will launch in 2014.
The board will include: Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association; Lisa Dubay, an Urban Institute Senior Fellow; Darrell Gaskin, an associate professor and a health economist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; Jennifer Goldberg, assistant director of Advocacy for Health Care at the Maryland Legal Aid Bureau; Enrique Martinez-Vidal, vice president at AcademyHealth and director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's State Coverage Initiatives program; and Thomas Saquella, former President of the Maryland Retailers Association.
Three other board members will be the secretary of the Maryland Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, the commissioner of the Maryland Insurance Administration and the executive director of the Maryland Health Care Commission. Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, the health secretary, will serve as the initial chairman.
The group will first be tasked with establishing advisory committees, adopting procurement guidelines and conducting a search for an executive director.
The state has so far received $7.2 million in federal dollars to implement the exchange.
O’Malley also signed executive orders establishing the Governor’s Office of Health Care Reform, and extending to advisory panels, the Health Care Reform Coordinating Council and the Health Quality and Cost Council. Carolyn Quattrocki, a former deputy legislative officer to the governor, was named executive director of the Office of Health Care Reform.
Comments
No Peter Beilenson? He's doing interesting stuff in Howard County and did a great job in Baltimore.
Posted by: Eric | May 27, 2011 10:41 AM
I can't wait until the day the U.S. enacts a single-payer healthcare system.
Posted by: Michelle Brown | May 27, 2011 12:56 PM