Massachusetts health insurance law of 2006 working, but challenges lie ahead, NYT editorial states

The "real test" of the 2006 Massachusetts health insurance law will come this year when higher penalties are levied on those who remain uninsured and the state determines "whether coverage can really be made mandatory without sparking political resistance," the New York Times writes in an editorial.

The editorial states that the plan "is off to a good start and is heartening evidence that national health care reform may be possible." According to the Times, the law already has covered about 350,000 of the estimated 650,000 Massachusetts residents who were without health insurance in 2006. While critics "are accurate when they say that coverage is hardly universal if 300,000 people still don't have insurance," the "plan is in its early days" and enrollment "has grown faster than expected," the Times states. Two original concerns -- that people could drop private plans to obtain subsidized coverage and that businesses could eliminate insurance plans for employees -- "have not materialized," according to the editorial.

The "key challenge" for Massachusetts "will be to keep costs under control and find new sources of revenue while maintaining widespread support for the program," the editorial adds. It concludes, "How well Massachusetts handles that challenge" will determine whether the plan "falls into a financial pit or points the way toward universal health coverage" (New York Times, 6/16).