{"id":849097,"date":"2025-05-17T22:12:26","date_gmt":"2025-05-18T03:12:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/17\/ruling-could-give-kennedy-more-power-over-health-care-coverage\/"},"modified":"2025-05-17T22:12:26","modified_gmt":"2025-05-18T03:12:26","slug":"ruling-could-give-kennedy-more-power-over-health-care-coverage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/17\/ruling-could-give-kennedy-more-power-over-health-care-coverage\/","title":{"rendered":"Ruling could give Kennedy more power over health care coverage"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A looming Supreme Court decision could result in Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wielding more control over the body that recommends preventive health services insurers must fully cover \u2014 a possibility that alarms health advocates.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Supreme Court heard arguments Monday in Kennedy v. Braidwood Management Inc., a case that will decide the fate of the 2010 health care law\u2019s requirement that insurers cover preventive health services recommended by an independent task force\u00a0with no cost-sharing to patients.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Trump administration argued the task force is constitutional because the HHS secretary has the power to fire its members and reject its recommendations\u00a0\u2014\u00a0a power the secretary has not exercised before.<\/p>\n

That could set up a scenario where a secretary rejects recommendations for coverage of health services or drugs like preexposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, which prevents HIV infection.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder RFK Jr., will we see what is looking more and more like a concerted effort to suppress HIV prevention services?\u201d asked Jeremiah Johnson, executive director of PrEP4All, referring to Kennedy\u2019s potential power over the task force.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The arguments Monday come as the Trump administration appears to be deprioritizing the federal government\u2019s HIV response by terminating grants to organizations that provide care for and research HIV. A leaked draft of the HHS budget \u201cpassback\u201d suggests the administration is considering eliminating the \u201cEnding the HIV Epidemic\u201d initiative, which President Donald Trump launched during his first term.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is not clear what the administration\u2019s goal is on HIV.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Trump vowed to end new infections in his first term, his second term saw the firing of nearly all Centers for Disease Control and Prevention staff working on HIV prevention. Trump has also favored allowing employers to opt out of covering health services they have religious objections to, like contraception.<\/p>\n

Advocates have worried that could eventually extend to PrEP.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of this seems to be adding up to a deeply concerning pattern. This administration may be uniquely focused on trying to undermine HIV prevention going forward, which would be a huge loss to the progress we have seen in the last couple of years,\u201d Johnson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The case<\/h2>\n

The plaintiff \u2014\u00a0Braidwood Management Inc., based in Texas \u2014\u00a0originally argued that the law\u2019s required coverage of PrEP violated the owner\u2019s religious beliefs. A lower court sided with the employer but did not extend the ruling more broadly, and the Biden administration did not appeal that part of the ruling.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A Supreme Court ruling in favor of the Trump administration, which is now defending the 2010 law, could result in the\u00a0HHS secretary having more power over the task force and its recommendations, said William\u00a0Walters, an associate at Epstein Becker Green, which wrote an amicus brief on behalf of HIV advocacy organizations.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear how Kennedy would wield that power \u2014 or if he would be interested in doing so.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order for the Task Force members\u2019 appointment to be constitutional, the Secretary likely needs to have the authority over the Task Force such that he can approve\/deny recommendations, and remove members at will,\u201d Walters said in an email. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPractically speaking, however, it\u2019s not entirely clear that Secretary Kennedy would exercise this authority in a way that alters the Task Force all that much,\u201d he wrote, adding that Kennedy appears more interested in vaccines than preventive services and screenings.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the arguments Monday, Hashim Mooppan, the Department of Justice attorney representing the administration, said, \u201cThe secretary can review task force recommendations and prevent them from taking effect. \u2026 He can direct the task force to rescind a recommendation, and he can replace task force members as needed to ensure that happens. In addition, he can require the task force to obtain his pre-approval before they issue any recommendation at all.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Overall, the justices seemed unlikely to overturn the task force as requested by the plaintiff, which argued it is unconstitutional because its members weren\u2019t confirmed by the Senate. The Trump administration\u2019s view is that the task force doesn\u2019t violate the Constitution because the secretary, who must be confirmed by the Senate, controls it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But if the court did overturn the task force, it could set insurance coverage of preventive care on its head. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Siding with the plaintiff could invalidate all recommendations made by the task force after the 2010 passage of the health care law, impacting insurance coverage of preventive health services from PrEP to HIV screening and testing and some cancer screenings.<\/p>\n

In 2019, the task force recommended the use of PrEP for people at high risk of contracting HIV, and insurers were required to cover it without cost-sharing beginning in 2021.<\/p>\n

Depending on the Supreme Court\u2019s ruling, insurers could be allowed to again reduce coverage and require cost-sharing \u2014 something that could pose challenges in accessing PrEP.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It could also impact insurance coverage of HIV screening; an estimated 13 percent <\/a>of people with HIV are undiagnosed.<\/p>\n

\u201cShould this court remove the requirement that health insurance cover Task Force-recommended HIV screening, the number of undiagnosed individuals \u2014\u00a0who will not know to seek treatment and will, therefore, unknowingly transmit the virus \u2014\u00a0will inevitably increase,\u201d dozens of HIV advocacy groups wrote in a brief to the court. \u201cWhen patients are forced to bear the cost of preventative services, they are less likely to utilize such services.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Any reductions in coverage would occur as PrEP science is improving. The FDA recently approved a long-acting injectable form of PrEP that promises to improve adherence compared with pills that must be taken daily. Forgetting doses can reduce effectiveness and make someone susceptible to infection again.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The task force expanded its recommendation in 2023 to include those new options, including the injectable form.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, depending on the ruling, people at risk of HIV could face more challenges accessing these scientific advancements.<\/p>\n

Uptake of PrEP is still lagging, experts say. About 1.2 million people in the U.S. are eligible for PrEP, according to the CDC, but less than\u00a0one-third\u00a0accessed it in 2021.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A study<\/a> published in HealthAffairs in 2024 found that people don\u2019t fill PrEP prescriptions when copays\u00a0increase from $0 to $10. \u201cAbandonment\u201d rates are substantially higher if out-of-pocket costs increase to more than $100, according to the study.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cEven a small increase doubled the risk that people would not pick up PrEP,\u201d said Lorraine T. Dean, a social epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University, who co-authored the study.\u00a0<\/p>\n

People were also more likely to pick up PrEP when their out-of-pocket costs dropped.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a clear relationship showing cost is really part of the deciding factor for people here,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A looming Supreme Court decision could result in Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wielding more control over the body that recommends preventive health services insurers must fully cover \u2014 a possibility that alarms health advocates.\u00a0 The Supreme Court heard arguments Monday in Kennedy v. Braidwood Management Inc., a case that will<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":849098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22303,4601],"tags":[10287,10720],"class_list":{"0":"post-849097","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kennedy","8":"category-ruling","9":"tag-kennedy","10":"tag-ruling"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=849097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/849098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=849097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=849097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=849097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}