(AP/WTVA) — Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney says the state will continue working on its health care exchange even though the U.S. Supreme Court could overturn the federal law that requires it.
The court is expected Thursday morning to release its decision concerning the constitutionality of President Obama's health care law.
That law requires everyone to buy health insurance and is aimed at providing health care coverage to the nation's uninsured, which includes 618,000 residents of Mississippi, or about 21 percent.
Under the law, each state must create a health care exchange that will allow people and small businesses to comparison shop for insurance starting in 2014.
Mississippi and other states filed suit after the law was signed in 2010. They argue the federal government cannot force people to buy health insurance.
Still, the Magnolia State has accepted federal money for the health care exchange.
In Alabama, Governor Robert Bentley says he will have to study the U.S. Supreme Court ruling before deciding what to do about an exchange for his state, which has 720,000 uninsured residents, or about 15.4 percent.
Bentley was successful in opposing efforts by some state lawmakers to enact an exchange in May.
