Kathy J. Greenlee, the assistant secretary of health and human services in charge of the program, said: “We do not have a viable path forward. We will not be working further to implement the Class Act.”

 Two early critics of the Class program — Senator John Thune of South Dakota and Representative Charles Boustany Jr. of Louisiana, both Republicans — said they had been vindicated.  “The Obama administration ignored repeated warnings about the financial solvency of this massive new entitlement and suppressed information on the viability of the program,” Mr. Thune said. In an interview, Mr. Boustany said that “in their haste to get the bill passed,” President Obama and Congressional Democrats ignored warnings about the program’s financial risks.  When Congress was developing the program in late 2009, Senator Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota and chairman of the Budget Committee, described it as “a Ponzi scheme of the first order” because it required an ever-increasing stream of premiums to cover the cost of benefits.

 The implications of this decision by the Obama administration may be far reaching.  The first item that comes to mind is: if the administration can arbitrarily decide not to pursue one provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), then how can we, as citizens of America trust them to enforce any aspects of the PPACA, passed by Congress in 2009.  Additionally, the PPACA entails so many different provisions that require insurance companies or employers to provide certain benefits at no cost to policy holders that insurance premiums will necessarily have to rise, increasing the costs of health insurance for everyone.  If the Federal Government can decide not to enforce one provision of the PPACA because of cost, then what is to prevent any insurance company from deciding not to include certain mandated coverage because of cost?  What is the difference, other than the Government has the force on its side?

 There are claims that the CLASS act within the PPACA was to account for 40% of the total savings that the PPACA was suppose to afford the country.  Now that this aspect of the PPACA has been removed from the equation, the supposed savings for the Federal government has to be reevaluated and the Federal budget adjusted accordingly.  If the additional funds now required to fund the entire PPACA are not available, then what is the ultimate fate of the PPACA?  Is it even feasible to implement the law?

 Politically, if the proponents of the PPACA decided to include the CLASS provision within the PPACA despite warnings from respected members of Congress, on both sides of the aisle, then what other unsustainable aspects are lurking within the PPACA.  The first one that comes to mind is the reported double counting of the savings in Medicare/Medicaid programs, which allow the proponents of the PPACA to claim that the PPACA is revenue neutral or will even save the country Billions of dollars over a ten year period.

What does mean to the private practice healthcare provider?  Initially, probably not much.  Healthcare providers will still be required to implement Electronic Medical Records into their practices, and other mandates within the PPACA, until it is declared void or unconstitutional.  There will probably be a greater urgency to reduce Medicare/Medicaid payments to healthcare providers to reduce the budgetary shortfall.  There will probably be even greater incentives to pursue perceived Medicare/Medicaid fraud cases to reduce payment sto healthcare providers. However, the long term aspect of this situation is that the entire PPACA probably is not financially viable.

 An interesting legal question that arises is the non-severability clause written into the PPACA. The proponents purposely wrote the non-severability clause into the bill because they knew that the entire bill’s financial viability was dependant on the healthcare insurance mandate, which is the clause being challenged by the states.  If the government admits that one aspect of the program is unsustainable and not being enforced, then does that make the entire bill void, due to the non-severability clause?