NU Online News Service, Feb. 9, 1:55 p.m.EST

Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., says efforts are under way to attachlegislation exempting insurance agents from the medical loss ratio(MLR) provision of the healthcare reform law to another billworking its way through the Senate.

Isakson said at theWashingtonmeeting of the Council of InsuranceAgents and Brokers (The Council) that attaching the legislation tosomething already on the Senate floor "…is the best way to passthings in the Senate."

Isakson and Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., his co-sponsor, will trythe attachment approach before introducing the bill incommittee. "Hopefully, visits today from brokers willincrease momentum for the bill," Isakson said.

The bill is S. 2068, the Access to Independent Health InsuranceAdvisors Act.

It would amend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act(PPACA) to give some relief to small agents hit especially hard bythe cutback in commissions that have occurred under PPACA.

At the same conference, Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., who isretiring, said PPACA should be "repaired, not replaced."

He reminded the agents and brokers that the healthcare mandatefashioned back when President Clinton was in office came from theRepublicans. "It is a Republican idea," he said.

The Landrieu-Isakson legislation specifically excludes agentcompensation from the MLR formula in the individual and small-groupmarkets.

Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and John Barrow, D-Ga., haveintroduced similar legislation in the House of Representatives.