Fleshing out a (real) ACA hardship story in the WSJ

It's inevitable that reporters' vignettes about ACA shoppers will often lack context or essential details. Print space is limited, readers' attention is limited,  reporters' time is limited, and protagonists' grasp of their own experience may even be limited.

Still, the back stories are often worth probing (3, 2, 1. 0). Here's one from today's Wall Street Journal, with Louise Radnofsky, Stephanie Armour, and Anna Wilde Mathews reporting on the first day of Open Season II. There's no inaccuracy, but the rate-shock subplot in this brief account does leave a question mark:

Smart messaging, with a large dollop of denial, from Aetna's Bertolini

The health insurance industry has sensed and seized -- or created -- a PR opportunity amid the mounting tension in the runup to the Supreme Court's decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act. First, UnitedHealth announced that it would continue to allow parents to cover adult children up to age 26, a requirement of the law, regardless of whether that part of the law was struck, and adhere to other ACA mandates, such as providing preventive services without copay and forgoing lifetime coverage caps. Aetna and others made similar announcements. Mark Bertolini, CEO of Aetna, has been particularly out front, giving interviews to the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post emphasizing Aetna's innovation in improving healthcare delivery and reducing costs.

There's some disingenuity in Bertolini's message as it's evolved over the past two weeks, however. Yesterday he told WonkBlog's Sarah Kliff that the Supreme Court decision doesn't matter, that Aetna and the industry will continue with innovation regardless of the decision, and that a deficit reduction deal is more important than the ACA.  That's backwards. If the ACA's new rules for health insurers and array of cost-cutting incentives for healthcare providers and insurers are left in place, they will likely have a bigger long-term impact on government spending than any tax-and-spending deal the Congress strikes. Bertolini's own boasts about Aetna's recent accomplishments and strategy indicate as much, though he's now working to unmoor their origin and continued impetus from the ACA.  Check out the denial in his exchange with Kliff: