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Reproductive Health Care: A Future in Flux with the Next Administration

Access to reproductive health care has been a part of the national debate for years, and even more so since 2022 when the US Supreme Court issued its ruling in Dobbs overturning decades of precedent established under Roe v....more

Agencies Release Final Mental Health Parity Rule

On Monday, September 9, 2024, the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury (the “Departments”) issued their final rule regarding the nonquantitative treatment limitation (NQTL) comparative analysis...more

Does Section 1557 Apply to Employer Group Health Plans? (And — Why That Question May Not Even Matter)

Seyfarth Synopsis: Following years of back and forth, new final rules were published by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on May 6, 2024 reinstituting the Department’s interpretation that the prohibition on...more

HHS Strengthens HIPAA Rules to Protect Reproductive Health Privacy

This past Monday, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued its final rule aimed at strengthening the HIPAA Privacy rules as they are applied to reproductive health data....more

Agencies Defer Final Action on Junk Insurance, While Suggesting Caution Against One Last “Binge”

The agencies have finalized a portion of their proposed rules impacting so-called “junk insurance” regarding short-term limited-duration insurance, but deferred finalizing the more significant changes that would have impacted...more

Employers Consider Post-Dobbs Playbook in Dealing with Alabama Ruling on IVF Treatments

Seyfarth Synopsis: Last week, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that cryogenically frozen embryos are children and are protected from destruction under state law. This is the latest in a series of post-Dobbs judicial rulings...more

Wellness Apps and Privacy

Employers looking to enhance their suite of employee benefit programs, and focused on lessons learned during the pandemic on wellbeing, are interested in providing greater access to wellness tools. And, the vendors who...more

The Long Wait for the Long-Term Part-Time Guidance is Over

Seyfarth Synopsis: It’s here for your post-Thanksgiving turkey hangover reading pleasure! The Department of Treasury and IRS released on Friday (in the middle of most people’s long holiday weekend) their proposed rules for...more

My Insurance Doesn’t Cover That? Agency Guidance on “Junk Insurance”

Seyfarth Synopsis: Fresh on the heels of the IRS Chief Counsel Memorandum on wellness and indemnity products, discussed in our prior post here, the agencies have weighed in with more formal and more expansive guidance...more

Multiple Cyber Incidents Impact Employee Benefit Plans and Participants

By this point, most people in the employee benefits space have heard about the MOVEit and Retirement Clearing House (RCH) cyber incidents, which could directly impact employers’ benefit plans. The MOVEit file transfer...more

FICA Tax Avoidance Wellness Program Viewed Unfavorably by 87,000 New IRS Agents

Seyfarth Synopsis: Just like a bad penny, schemes promising employers ways to reduce their FICA tax burden, and maybe their employees’ income tax burden at the same time, keep popping up with a slightly different burnish on...more

New Guidance on Gag Clause Attestation

Seyfarth Synopsis: The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (“CAA”) contains a requirement that that group health plans may not have agreements with service providers that would restrict certain information that the plan may...more

Dueling District Courts on Mifepristone: Texas Judge Suspends Approval While Washington Judge Enjoins Changing Status Quo

Seyfarth Synopsis: In an anticipated decision, released late on Friday April 7, 2023 of the Easter weekend, Texas District Court Judge Kacsmaryk has halted the FDA’s approval of Mifepristone. While in Washington State,...more

Texas District Court Nullifies Portions of Preventive Care Mandate

Seyfarth Synopsis: Following over a decade of protracted litigation over the Affordable Care Act, and several failed attempts by Congress to get rid of the ACA entirely, a Texas federal district court ruled on March 30, 2023...more

Do We Finally Have a Final Answer on ESG Investments and ERISA’s Fiduciary Duties?

Seyfarth Synopsis: At the end of November, the DOL issued final regulations on ERISA’s fiduciary duties when investing plan assets. According to the DOL, these final regulations retain the longstanding core principles that...more

Federal Government Response to Dobbs Begins to Take Shape

As we have been covering, the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade in their Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, leaving it to states to regulate access to abortion in their territory. The Biden Administration’s...more

Leaked Opinion Becomes Reality — Roe v. Wade is Overturned

Culminating a flurry of late June opinions released by SCOTUS this week, the court today in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has taken the extraordinary step of ending decades of precedent surrounding the...more

SECURE 2.0: Here We Go Again

Seyfarth Synopsis: The SECURE Act, passed just before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic at the end of 2019, significantly altered the retirement plan landscape. For a reminder on how the SECURE Act changed the retirement...more

How Do You Really Feel? DOL Talks ESG and Crypto

Seyfarth Synopsis: In keeping with their recent more vocal stance on fiduciary duties, the Department of Labor has weighed in on the wisdom of 401(k) plans including an ESG fund or a crypto investment option in its line-up....more

No More Surprises, But Much Uncertainty Over Non-Network Bills

Seyfarth Synopsis: Last summer and fall, the Departments of Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services issued Interim Final Rules (IFRs) [here] and [here], implementing the sweeping changes that applied to out-of-network...more

Another Swing in DOL Investment Position

Seyfarth Synopsis: Reminiscent of the DOL’s about-face on ESG investing by ERISA fiduciaries [discussed here], this week the DOL has issued a “supplemental statement” on its view of the use of private equity investments in...more

Feeling Like a Yo-Yo? Latest Swing in ESG Investments and ERISA’s Fiduciary Duties

Seyfarth Synopsis: For those of you following the saga of ERISA’s fiduciary duties and ESG investing, we are nearing a possible finish line. The latest turn in the saga came when the DOL issued a new set of proposed...more

More Vax Facts – The Agencies Weigh In

Seyfarth Synopsis: We previously discussed how to apply the HIPAA wellness rules to a premium differential based on a participant’s vaccination status in our Legal Update. At the time, we were left to interpret the existing...more

Anti-Vax Tax Facts: Legal Considerations for Premium Differentials Based on Vaccination Status

Seyfarth Synopsis: As employers continue to struggle with strategies for safely re-opening their workplaces, we have previously discussed the possibility of mandating a vaccine or providing incentives for getting the vaccine....more

Agencies Add Lengthy “No Surprises Act” Regulations to your Summer Reading List: Overview of Impact on Employer-Sponsored Plans

Seyfarth Synopsis: The No Surprises Act (the “Act”) was part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 signed into law last December 2020. The Act was aimed at protecting insured individuals from getting a bill from a...more

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