Social Workers Call on Congress to Reject Destructive Insurance Bill – Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization & Affordability Act

Senate Markup to Continue March 15

Washington – The National Association of Social Workers, along with other mental health advocacy groups, opposes the Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization & Affordability Act (HIMMA, S. 1955).  NASW believes this sweeping health insurance legislation undermines insurance coverage for millions of Americans, particularly eliminating 39 state mental health parity laws and 32 state mental health mandate laws that ensure access to essential behavioral health benefits and to qualified social work services.

With the Senate markup to continue on Wednesday, NASW, representing the largest profession providing mental health services, is calling on Congress to reject S. 1955 and not preempt laws that guarantee coverage for mental health services and access to clinical social work services.

“Social workers care about ensuring clients’ access to a full range of necessary health services, including parity for behavioral health benefits,” says Jim Finley, senior government relations associate for NASW.  “NASW believes that the way toward universal insurance coverage is to enlarge health care coverage, rather than spread bare-bones coverage to lower risk groups and charge higher-risk and older Americans more to retain comprehensive coverage.”

Social workers provide millions of Americans high quality behavioral health services.  Besides eliminating benefit mandates, HIMMA preempts state provider mandates and threatens access to essential social work services.  Currently, 28 states mandate coverage  of care provided by social workers.  NASW will not accept the bill without language including all qualified licensed providers of health and behavioral health care services, thus protecting access to social workers for millions of Americans seeking necessary behavioral health care.

NASW also calls on Congress to ensure an independent analysis is conducted on the impact of the bill in rewriting insurance coverage protections for millions of Americans before the Senate passes it. 

For more information about NASW’s efforts to oppose this act, please visit http://www.socialworkers.org/advocacy/alerts/030306.asp

The National Association of Social Workers (NASW), in Washington, DC, is the largest membership organization of professional social workers with 140,000 members. It promotes, develops, and protects the practice of social work and social workers. NASW also seeks to enhance the well being of individuals, families, and communities through its advocacy.