States Divergent In Plans For Health Care Ruling

States divergent in plans for health care ruling Associated Press Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Updated 04:46 p.m., Wednesday, June 27, 2012 CHICAGO (AP) — As the nation awaits the Supreme Court ruling on President Barak Obama's health care overhaul, states across the country are considering how they will respond to the historic decision. Oregon's Legislature voted in 2009, a year before Obama's overhaul was approved, to create an online state health insurance exchange. If the court strikes down only the federal requirement that almost everyone obtain health insurance, the state's exchange director Rocky King says he still can build a profitable exchange to launch in 2014. In that scenario, state officials would have to wait for cues from the Obama administration and for Congress to decide a path forward, King said. The state also has banned insurers from refusing coverage for children with pre-existing illnesses and allowed young adults to stay on their parents' plans through age 26. In Massachusetts, which laid the groundwork for the federal health care law with a sweeping 2006 state program, officials say they will continue efforts to expand coverage to nearly all residents no matter what. "Even in a worst-case scenario of the health care law being struck down entirely, Massachusetts is going to forge ahead," said Glen Shor, executive director of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority. Robert Kraig, executive director of Citizen Action of Wisconsin, a health care advocacy group that supports the law and expanding health insurance coverage, said the governor is "on the far end of the spectrum in terms of trying to block the law and doing nothing to prepare for it." In Michigan, House Republicans have refused to let state officials start setting up the MI Health Marketplace before the Supreme Court ruling. In Indiana, Republican Gov.