Topics in Health Insurance Law and Regulation

1 unit

Private health insurance is the primary vehicle through which access to healthcare is assured in the United States. For this reason, the law and regulation of health insurance is of vital importance to a wide variety of different types of lawyers and public policy advocates. This topic is nonetheless often only covered tangentially in traditional law school classes like Insurance Law, Health Law, and Employee Benefits. This condensed class will survey major issues in the law and regulation of U.S. health insurance. Topics that may be covered (depending on time constraints) include (i) the Affordable Care Act (i.e. Obamacare) and its regulation of private health insurers, (ii) State regulation of private health insurers, (iii) ERISA's regulation of employer-sponsored health plans, and (iv) State and federal laws governing the resolution of health insurance coverage disputes (both through courts and via internal and external review of coverage decisions). The class will not cover issues related to public health insurance programs like Medicare and Medicaid. It will not assume that students have any particular background in health or insurance law, and will be geared in equal parts to developing a basic understanding of the technical legal and regulatory issues in this domain and to discussing the insurance-specific policy issues surrounding health care reform. 1 unit.