Atlanta Mayor Promotes Insurance Exchange, Defends Health Reform Law

In the City Hall atrium, Mayor Kasim Reed encouraged several hundred city employees to spread the word about the exchange. He also offered a strong defense of the law and the president.

“All of this noise and back and forth and anger and rage is being directed at somebody that’s just trying to make sure you have health insurance. Can you believe it?”

Reed called out state leaders in a general way for not doing their part to educate the public about the law. However, Reed stopped short of criticizing Gov. Nathan Deal, who opted out of a state-based exchange and rejected the law’s Medicaid expansion.

“I’m not going to try to persuade the governor to believe something that he’s never going to believe. And he doesn’t try to persuade me that I shouldn’t support the Affordable Care Act,” said Reed.

Georgia’s health exchange, which can be found on the web at healthcare.gov, went online October 1, but remains plagued by technical issues. 

And then there's consumers' familiarity with the exchanges, or more accurately, their lack of familiarity.   

“I didn’t know any of this was going on,” says City of Atlanta employee Pamela Hicks as she stands beside an information table full of Obamacare pamphlets and information cards. “I didn’t know you’d get penalized if you didn’t have insurance.”

Hicks says she pays about $200 a month for her Kaiser Permanente family plan, an amount she finds “reasonable.”  

Today, she asks questions so she can talk about the law with uninsured friends and family. 

“Basically what I’m doing is passing on the information to people I know use the emergency room for treatment, for basic treatment,” she says.  

Navigator Alecia Distin walks Hicks through the exchange process.  She's able to quickly answer Hicks' questions because she says most people ask the same ones.

“What are the premiums going to be like? How much is this going ot cost me out of pocket?  If I don’t like my job insurance can I go to the marketplace?”

Answering questions is all Distin can do for now.

She’s met all federal navigator requirements, but Georgia has its own test.  And until the state issues her license, she can’t legally help people enroll. 

Distin expects to have her state license in-hand within the next week or so. 

Georgia has certified 17 navigators as of Wednesday, up from just three one week ago.