Before Vermont Health Connect’s troubled launch in 2013, I called on the Administration to delay the implementation, fearing the website wasn’t ready and Vermonters’ health care security would be put at risk. Nearly three years later, I know my early fears were correct – and it is long past time that Vermont switched to a system that works.
While continually calling for greater oversight and transparency in the Exchange, my office has fielded more than 100 individual calls about problems with Vermont Health Connect, and helped more than 50 people resolve ongoing and complex issues.
However, this is not a solution. Vermonters are paying some of the highest rates in the country for a system which does not work. We must find out which option is the best for us: the federal exchange or a state partnership model. Then we must go with that option; Vermonters have suffered enough.