Health coverage sign up deadline, but open enrollment thru March 31

There's a certain degree of misunderstanding about deadlines and what's in store relating to the new health care law, the Affordable Care Act. Here's an important deadline - there is a requirement to have health insurance in 2014 or face a fine. Arrangements must be made for coverage with an employer or with private companies for purchasing health insurance. This includes buying it by signing up on a federal website.

Critics have said that the deadlines in the ObamaCare enrollment process have been a moving target and that has partly been the cause of the confusion. What affects us locally is that Texas is serviced by the federal enrollment website, HealthCare.gov.

By going on this website, a health insurance policy may be selected and purchased for coverage in 2014. But in order to have coverage begin, this needs to be done by the end of the day on Monday, January 1 followed by a payment. As is the case with any insurance plan, enrollees have to pay the first month's premium to begin coverage.

Take note, however, that potential enrollees still have until the end of March to get insurance. After that time, the federal government will fine those without coverage.

So putting it simply, Monday is the deadline for residents to sign up for ObamaCare if they want coverage starting January 1. The deadline to enroll in coverage to avoid a fine is March 31. That's the date that the program's open enrollment period officially ends. Another reported deadline, October 15th, is when enrollment will reopen.

In Fort Bend, according to Carolyn Edwards, CEO of Access Health in Richmond, there are only five health insurance companies with approved plans offering the essential benefits of the national health law. They are Humana, Aetna, Signa, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Community Health Choice. Plans that do not have the essential benefits set forth by the Affordable Health Act cannot participate in the health marketplace.

Edwards said people can continue to keep employer plans but the plans have to meet the essential benefits. Those reportedly loosing the plans are doing so because the health plans not have the benefits required by the federal health law.

Access Health is a federally qualified community health center providing services at a reduced cost. It operates with a $15 million budget with funds from the federal government, state health department, United Way, insurance company billings and sliding fee scale charges.

Edwards says Access Health can help answer questions from anyone about health insurance coverage and will also assist with the electronic or other walk-through process. Its hotline is 281-633-3175, and the agency has a live person on the phone unless staff is tied up helping others. Persons leaving messages with contact information will be called back, said Edwards.

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Kim Kardashian: Was She Right About Warning Kendall Jenner that Harry Styles ...

Kanye West's fiancé and reality star Kim Kardashian did what every big sister would do: watch out for their younger sister. This is what Kim Kardashian did about warning Kendall Jenner about Harry Styles.

Reuters Kanye West Wants Kim Kardashian to Land the Vogue Cover at Any Cost

As reported by Life, Kim Kardashian warned her younger sister, Kendall Jenner, who had just turned eighteen to be careful with Harry Styles. Read full article here: Kim Kardashian Afraid Harry Styles Will Cheat On Kendall Jenner

It was said that Kim Kardashian has been worried that the British singer would eventually cheat on Kendall Jenner as he is a known playboy. When the two had started 'dating,' a source interviewed by hollywoodlife.com had said that the two were very much infatuated with each other:

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'It was originally for publicity, but this is a case of hormones winning the fight, Harry likes her. He is having lots of fun with her and thinks she is cool and hot. And he likes that Kendall is trying really hard to get him for her own exclusive relationship. They could definitely be considered as boyfriend-girlfriend bound.'

So what had happened now?

Recent reports say that Styles is 'utterly bored to the verge of tears' when he is with Kendall Jenner. Not so infatuated anymore, huh Styles?

Kim Kardashian may have been right about Harry Styles on warning her younger sister about guys like him. Did Kendall Jenner really think this would happen to her? We guess not but she is a beautiful woman and it won't be long until there is a long line of other handsome men lining up to date her - Austin Mahone, perhaps?

The 'Keeping up with the Kardashians' reality star, Kim Kardashian may have made a few utterly wrong mistakes but she sure does know how to read men and maybe she was right about Harry Styles all along. She must also be right about Kanye West this time around.

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Kim Kardashian's baby North's got bling!

Baby North West has more than just two of the most famous parents on the planet: She's got bling!

Proving her baby wasn't just born with a silver spoon in her mouth, Kim Kardashian started the new year by posting this photo of her little girl clutching her 15-carat diamond engagement ring on Instagram. That little baubel is said to be worth $8 million, slightly more than the rattles ordinary bourgeoise babies are forced to play with. And although the photo spoke volumes on its own, Kim drove home her point with the accompanying comment: '

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Designer Katie Eary: Kanye West believed in me when others didn't

Katie Eary wants to provoke a reaction in people with<br />her designs (Picture: Eamonn M McCormack/Getty Images)

Designer Katie Eary plans to give Savile Row tailoring an edge. We meet her ahead of London Collections: Men.

Menswear designer Katie Eary is in the depths of preparing for her AW14 collection at home on an estate near Hoxton, east London. She's anxiously trying to find the trainers she's created for the show as famed Savile Row tailor Richard Anderson looks on.

Dressed immaculately in a suit, Anderson looks incredibly relaxed as he sips a brew in Eary's digs, which seem a world away from his usual Mayfair surroundings. The pair have joined forces for her show, which takes place on Wednesday at London Collections: Men.

Eary's designs have been made in Anderson's prestigious atelier. 'We made them the exact way as we make our suits,' he says. 'We put 50 to 60 man hours into our suits and we've done that with Katie's, and the results are really good.'

It's not the most obvious pairing. Eary may have worked for Kanye West and just bagged a womenswear collection with River Island but she's still one of the new kids on the block. Many of the designers showing at London Collections: Men are graduates from Central Saint Martins or the Royal College Of Arts and have been on the scene for a few years but their brands are young in comparison with the established heritage labels.

Anderson, on the other hand, sits firmly in the camp of the old guard, along with other Savile Row tailors and big names that are increasingly joining the London Collections roster. The pair hope to show there needn't be any tension between the two worlds.

Working with young designers is paramount to ensure Savile Row has a relationship with the contemporary world, says Anderson. 'You have to look forward,' he explains. 'If you don't, you're not going to progress.' Does he believe other Row tailors share his views? 'Hopefully they'll see it as progressive,' he says.

Eary admits she initially felt intimidated by Savile Row. 'I never ever looked at it and thought I should go there,' she says. But she changed her mind after her stylist, Way Perry, introduced her to Anderson. 'There are a lot of unapproachable people on Savile Row, so the introduction was important,' she says.

Since launching her eponymous line in 2009 after a stint at Levi's, the Stevenage-born designer has been making waves on the menswear scene. Her clothes aren't for the faint-hearted. Eary wants to provoke a reaction with her designs, positive or negative.

Katie Eary with singer Kanye West (Picture: Rex)

'I used to worry people would hate what I did,' she says. 'I think I have an issue because I've come from nothing and others have had it handed to them, so I've been a bit aggressive, putting things in people's faces. I overcompensate because of where I'm from. I want to impress people; I want them to feel something. But if they're going to hate it, I'm going to give them a reason to hate it.'

If the recession has made some designers more inclined to play it safe, Eary missed the memo. She's committed to her vision, sending men stomping down the runway in everything from flamingo prints to bold, clashing colour combinations that are a assault on the eyes. 'It's this strong graphic aesthetic that customers are responding to so well,' says buyer Sam Lobban from online menswear retailer Mr Porter, whose London Collection collaboration with Eary, and a handful of other designers, was one of the most popular last year.

Her streetwear has been worn by the likes of Jaden Smith, Rihanna and hip hop collective A$AP Mob. But with her partnership with Anderson, it was important to showcase the craftsmanship of the clothes. 'The colours and prints have overshadowed that in the past,' she says.

She attributes her love of tailoring to Yves Saint Laurent designer and former Dior Homme artistic director Hedi Slimane. 'I'd never seen tailoring the way he did it in 2006,' she enthuses. 'He picked young boys and put them in slim-fitted suits. I didn't think of a suit being worn by a slim 17-year-old. Suits were for older people who worked in a bank, not this cool kid who's in a band and is sassy. It put tailoring in a whole new context for me.'

Eary also tried to give tailoring a twist. 'I wanted to do something Savile Row has never done before,' she says. 'Punk is all about doing it yourself so my thoughts were: 'What could we do if we took it to the highest grade?' That's how the project started.'

Expect to see new prints too. 'Now, anyone can take an image off the internet, put it on a T-shirt and call themselves a designer,' she says. 'It's an insult to have people ripping you off based on an image you've used. I just can't deal with it. The streetwear thing needed to change with this collection.'

I can't leave without asking about her friendship with West. 'He believed in me more than anyone for a long time,' she says. 'He still helps me.'

Has he seen the collection? 'Yeah. He always sees everything first. He's seen the prints and loves them.'

London Collections: Men takes place between January 6-8. www.londoncollections.co.uk/men

Health care changes to watch for in 2014

Pricing transparency, possible Medicaid expansion by states and the law's impact on elections are all things to watch.

WASHINGTON - Starting Wednesday, the Affordable Care Act was in full force, as millions of uninsured Americans either now have health coverage or will get it this year.

But experts say that's just one of many changes to watch for in 2014, including how the law will affect elections, what the states will decide about Medicaid expansion, and what insurers will do to react to their quickly changing demographics.

Already, at least 1.1 million people have gained coverage through the federal exchange, HealthCare.gov, and the federal and state exchanges stand to enroll millions more through the cut-off date at the end of March. Beginning Jan. 1, insurers may no longer preclude people from buying insurance because of pre-existing conditions; they may not charge older people much-higher premiums than younger people; they may not charge women more than men; and they must share pricing and benefits information to their consumers in an apples-to-apples way.

Beyond the law's new requirements, analysts and industry officials say they anticipate a series of related changes to affect health care in 2014, including:

* Private exchanges. Insurers will bring more private exchanges to the workplace, and people will begin to understand they have to control their own health costs instead of relying on benefit-heavy insurance plans to do that for them, said Alan Cohen, chief strategy officer for Liazon, a company that provides private exchanges.

'I think we're going to see dramatic, dramatic increases in people who use private exchanges,' Cohen said. 'There was a big increase this year, but it will pale in comparison to next year.'

Alan Cohen(Photo: Liazon)

* Employer mandate. Employers will also start making changes to prepare for the requirement that companies with more than 50 employees provide health insurance for their employees, said Hector De La Torre, executive director of the Transamerica Center for Health Studies. That requirement was supposed to start Jan. 1 but was delayed a year by the Obama administration.

'Employers are really going to be on the clock for 2015 for their mandate kicking in,' De La Torre said. 'That will be interesting throughout the year as regulations come into play.'

More employers and insurers will also start offering wellness discounts, which are meant to encourage employees to take better care of themselves in order to get lower premiums, he said.

* Pricing transparency. Regardless of the political storms surrounding the law, the health industry is proceeding with the assumption it is here for good, said Ceci Connolly, managing director of PWC's Health Research Institute.

That will lead, she said, to more transparency in the pricing of health services. The law requires insurers to tell customers how much they are expected to pay in out-of-pocket costs, but so far health care providers have not followed suit by listing prices for treatments. Some states are requiring providers to do that, Connolly said.

'Price transparency is kicking in,' she said. ' We really think that's going to take off in 2014.'

* New rules and higher enrollments. Ellen Nelson, who heads up Affordable Care Act's implementation at Catamaran, a pharmacy benefit manager serving 25 million people, said she expects an 'avalanche' of rules and guidance from the Department of Health and Human Services about the law and a surge in enrollments from Jan. 1 through March 31. That's the deadline for people to have insurance or pay for a fine.

'We expect that March 31 deadline date to get bumped out to May 1,' Nelson said. 'If it does, it won't be until mid-year, like June, that we'll know who has enrolled in 2014.'

* Electronic records. Adoption of electronic records will increase in 2014 and spur industry-wide change, said Rainu Kaushal, chairwoman of the new Department of Healthcare Policy and Research at Weill Cornell Medical College. That's in part because more physicians will have to use the records to participate in Medicare.

This will lead to higher quality and efficiency, Kaushal said, because providers will be better able to track what works - and what doesn't.

* Shrinking networks. Insurers will continue to limit their networks of health care providers, often by using those providers with which it can negotiate better rates, said Kev Coleman, head of data and research at HealthPocket.

'I think this network issue is going to become one of the top stories in 2014,' Coleman said.

For most people, he said, particularly for first-time insurance purchasers, that won't matter. 'If you never see a doctor, the question's a little more academic,' Coleman said. But for a person with diabetes or lymphoma, it's important to make sure specialty doctors are included in new plans.

* States will drive change. Medicaid, which is run by the states, will have the most impact on local price structures, said Ray Scheppach, project director for the Health Care Cost Containment Commission and a former deputy director of the Congressional Budget Office.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich expanded Medicaid in his state over the objections of fellow Republicans in the Legislature.(Photo: Tony Dejak, AP)

Medicaid administrators, Scheppach said, could move away from fee-for-service models to accountable care organizations and medical homes, where payment is based on low-cost, quality-outcome methods.

'Medicare's important, but if you start to add up the number of people in Medicaid, plus state employees, plus exchanges, the states can drive the model,' he said.

Some states will also decide this year whether to expand their Medicaid programs, as allowed by the health law.

'There are 36 governors up (for election); that's a big collection of governors,' Scheppach said. 'That cedes into how many additional states expand Medicaid. I think that's the biggest issue.'

Follow @KellySKennedy on Twitter.

Insured, finally: Families put Obamacare to the real test

22 minutes ago

For the 2.1 million people who've signed up for health insurance under the new federal and state exchanges, Jan. 1 is when the rubber meets the road.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius called it 'an exciting new day in health care' as latest enrollment figures were released Tuesday. But for people like the Schulz family of Phoenix, Ariz., Rita Rizzo and Lou Vincent of Akron, Ohio, and Joyce Moore of Zionsville, Pa., it's the first test of whether Obamacare will really work.

They all say they're relieved and excited to finally have new access to health care, and they hope that the rocky rollout of the exchanges under the Affordable Care Act will actually give way to the smooth delivery of vital medical services.

'I've been afraid for the last three years to get preventive care, because if they found something, I couldn't afford to treat it,' said Rizzo, 59, who runs a management training business with her husband. 'I haven't had any blood work in three years and my right hip is starting to give out.'

But now that she and Vincent, 64, are covered by a new CareSource silver-level plan under the federal exchange, he's insured for the first time in years after being denied by dozens of private plans because he has high blood pressure and diabetes. And Rizzo said they'll pay $184 a month, with a $2,000 deductible and a maximum of $3,400 out of pocket, far less than the $400 a month and $6,000 deductible they were paying for her alone with a private plan.

'The coverage is wonderful,' said Rizzo. 'We'll get prescription coverage. Right now, his prescriptions alone are $170 a month.'

The Ohio couple are among the more than 2.1 million people to sign up under the federal and state exchanges and another 3.9 million new Americans who qualify for Medicaid, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reported Tuesday.

Expanding health insurance to some 32 million uninsured people was the goal of the 2010 Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. The new enrollments, however, are still far short of the 3.3 million the White House was hoping for by year's end - or the 7 million initial sign-ups projected by the Congressional Budget Office. People have until March 31 to sign up for coverage in 2014 or face fines.

Still, Rizzo's optimism is shared by Claudia and Joseph Schulz, who started trying to sign up for Obamacare on Oct. 1, the first morning the federally run Arizona exchange was open, and only succeeded in the last hours of an extended deadline on Christmas Eve.

The pair quit their jobs in September to start an independent real estate business, putting them among some 1.5 million newly self-employed people projected to seek coverage under the ACA, according to a Georgetown University study.

That left them frustrated and a little nervous about the repeated glitches and long delays of the sign-up process. But Claudia Schulz, 34, said she and her 37-year-old husband always expected it to work out eventually.

'We weren't happy that the website wasn't working,' said Claudia Schulz. 'But we figured it's the U.S. government. I'm sure they'll fix the website.'

For the past four months, the couple has been paying $1,600 a month for COBRA benefits to extend the insurance provided by Joseph Schulz's former job as a mortgage broker. Now, however, with a silver-level plan through Health Net of Arizona, they'll pay just about $700 a month to cover themselves and their three children, ages 2, 7 and 10. There's a $3,000 deductible and $12,000 maximum out-of-pocket payment per year.

That's more, certainly, than the $420 they were paying through the employer-sponsored care through Joseph Schulz's job, but it allows them to pursue their longtime dream of working for themselves, Claudia Schulz said.

'We are very happy with our choice and so glad we had the ability to compare so many options and choose for ourselves,' she said.

Joyce Moore, a Pennsylvania financial planner, is pleased, too, even though she was among at least 4 million people whose private insurance policies were canceled, sparking criticisms of President Barack Obama's early promises that people who liked their plans could keep their plans.

An estimated 11 million to 19 million people previoulsy got insurance through the private insurance market. That's dwarfed by the 149 million people who get insurance through an employer and another 97 million who get government coverage through Medicare, Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program or CHIP.

'I was expecting it to be canceled. The idea that you can keep your plan was never an option for me,' said Moore, 58, who runs her own retirement and estate planning business. 'That was fine with me because my plan was awful.'

Under the old plan, Moore paid a $550 monthly premium and had a limit of $8,500 a year for out-of-pocket costs - for one person.

'If you had to have surgery that year, you'd have to have $10,000 set aside just for medical bills,' said Moore, who signed up for a silver-level plan with provider Geisinger. 'Under my new plan, the premium is $100 less a month and the out-of-pocket is $4,750 less per year.'

But Moore, a longtime supporter of the ACA, said she was dismayed by the botched exchange rollout and by the Obama administration's last-minute deadline extensions and other changes, such as allowing people with canceled private plans to apply for 'hardship' exemptions to keep them.

'Changing the rules in the middle of the game is not the way to go about it,' Moore said.

She said she worries that the flubbed launch will discourage young people - the very people needed to help make the system work - from signing up.

'It might take years to overcome the damage caused by this rollout,' she said.

For now, though, newly insured people like Rizzo and Vincent have finished their countdown to insurance and are making appointments with new doctors in the new year.

Vincent will need prescriptions for the medications that keep his high blood pressure and diabetes in check. Rizzo said she'd like to see about a host of ailments, including her sore hip, a broken rib that healed funny and a cyst in her throat - all conditions that she simply endured because she didn't want to pay for treating them.

'I'm going to be 60 next month and that's when I hear you start to unravel,' she said. 'I'm starting to see the first threads.'

JoNel Aleccia is a senior health reporter with NBC News. Reach her on Twitter at @JoNel_Aleccia or send her an email.

Kimye brag about love in cringey vid

THEY cannot be serious... Oh, wait, yes, they can. Kanye West and Kim Kardashian have let slip (read: leaked) a video, which documents just how much they really, really, really love each other.

Radaronline is reporting that as paparazzi video of the couple rolls, it is interspersed with interviews that both gave about each other, bragging endlessly about their love affair (little North West only appears briefly. We can't work out if this is because they're protecting her privacy or don't want the attention taken away from them).

'I've never loved any girl, other than my mother, as much as I love my girlfriend,' says West, adding (in case we'd forgotten): 'I'm so happy to be with her.'

Then, in a scene reminiscent of his infamous 'Single Ladies is the greatest video of ALL time' Taylor Swift stage invasion of a few years ago, West bleats: 'Y'all acting like this ain't the most beautiful woman of all time. Arguably of human existence, the top 10.' There's also a screen shot from their ridiculous Bound 2 video (OK, they must be joking).

Kardashian adds a few of her own pearls of wisdom, saying that she doesn't understand why it took so long for the two of them to get together.

'I feel like we've been through a lot together as friends and he's always been so supportive in my life,' coos Kardashian.

West then opines that Kardashian is 'the only girl that doesn't want me for money,' and says he thanks God daily for their relationship.

'I love the fact that God has put her in my life every single day.'

You have permission to throw up now.