Senate Bill Includes APA Initiative Requiring Health Plans to Show Compliance With Parity

The Senate Committee on Health, Labor, and Pensions (HELP Committee) last month released the Lower Health Care Costs Act, a series of initiatives addressing the high cost of health care. The legislation also includes a bill for which APA is advocating, the Mental Health Parity Compliance Act of 2019.

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The parity compliance act seeks to promote transparency and compliance with the federal Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act by federally regulated group health plans. It requires insurance companies to conduct and produce analyses demonstrating that they are, in fact, complying with the law and providing required access to mental health and substance use care.

The newly introduced bill provides a complement to APA model legislation passed in several states that applies to state regulated plans. Parity legislation identical to or with similarities to APA’s model legislation has been passed in Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, Wyoming, and the District of Columbia. The legislation also passed in Connecticut and was expected to be signed at press time.

APA members lobbied Capitol Hill in March to build support for the parity proposal, which is being sponsored in the Senate by Sens. Murphy (D-Conn.) and Cassidy (R-La.) and in the House by Reps. Porter (D-Calif.), Bilirakis (R-Fla.), Norcross (D-N.J.), and Mullin (R-Okla).

APA administration has worked closely with these Senate leaders for many months to build support with the leadership of the HELP Committee, which is led by chair Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and ranking member Patty Murray (D-Wash.).

In addition, APA President Bruce Schwartz, M.D., lobbied Capitol Hill earlier this summer to promote the bill. With him on that visit were the leaders of medical societies that are part of the coalition known as Frontline Physicians: The Group of Six. The coalition includes APA, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Physicians, the American College of Obstetrician-Gynecologists, and the American Osteopathic Association.

“We have also mobilized the national mental health community, which is strongly supporting the bill,” said APA CEO and Medical Director Saul Levin, M.D., M.P.A. “The inclusion of our proposal in the Lower Health Care Costs Act that Sens. Alexander and Murray released is a major step that shows our bipartisan initiative to be garnering interest on Capitol Hill. This is one step in the legislative process and much more remains to be done.” ■