Your health insurance bill could nearly double next year — and most people don’t even know it.
I walked the hospital floors during COVID, side by side with physicians who were already stretched thin. I saw the exhaustion, the moral injury, and the way systemic cracks always landed on the provider. And once again, Washington is setting the stage for more stress at the bedside.
🔍 What’s really happening
- ACA premium subsidies (expanded in 2021) are set to expire in December 2025.
- Without them, premiums snap back to pre-2021 formulas.
- The fight over extending them is fueling a looming shutdown.
📊 The numbers
- Premiums would rise 75–114% for ACA enrollees【KFF, 2025】.
- Example: A 27-year-old making $35K → premiums jump from $1,033 to $2,615 (+153%).
- 4–7 million could lose coverage【RWJF】.
- $32 billion lost provider revenue, $7.7 billion more uncompensated care【RWJF】.
🏥 What it means in your exam room
- Patients delay care until they can afford it.
- Conditions worsen.
- Physicians carry more unpaid labor, more moral injury, more exhaustion.
🏆 Winners vs. Losers
Winners: Insurance giants, politicians who point fingers.
Losers: Patients, small businesses, rural hospitals, and you — the physicians carrying this weight.
What Can You Do?
Policy fights might feel abstract. But they always land in your body.
If you’re feeling
the toll, EMDR intensives can help reset your nervous system so you can carry
less of what
isn’t yours.
👉 Learn more about physician intensives here..
References
- Kaiser Family Foundation. (2025, Sept). ACA marketplace premiums analysis. https://www.kff.org/health-reform/issue-brief/aca-premiums-double-if-subsidies-expire-2026
- Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. (2025). Coverage and uncompensated care projections.
👉 Ready to reclaim clarity and calm, no matter what Washington decides? Book a Strategy Session
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