On August 1, 2007, New York’s Governor Spitzer signed into law S.3986-A, a bill intended to decrease friction between managed care plans and their participating providers on certain sensitive issues.  Most significantly, if a health plan requires that certain health care services be preauthorized in order to be covered, then once a service has been preauthorized and performed, the plan may not thereafter deny coverage for the service. 

On January 17, 2007, lawmakers in the House and Senate introduced identical bills (H.R. 506 and S. 325) aimed at funding innovative State initiatives that expand coverage and access to the uninsured and improve quality and efficiency in the health care system.  The bills, the “Health Partnership Act”