On October 14, Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that the department is calling for a halt to the implementation of the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports program (CLASS Act). In a letter to congressional leaders, Secretary Sebelius noted the department was not able to develop a sustainable solution for the program. The Congressional Budget Office had scored CLASS as achieving $86 billion in savings over the next decade, because it would have collected premiums for five years before paying any benefits. Even without CLASS, the Affordable Care Act still decreases the federal deficit, by $127 billion over the next decade, as scored by CBO.

The CLASS was designed as a voluntary long-term care insurance program, to be supported by premiums paid by people who join it — without any infusion of tax dollars. However, the department was not able to develop a solution to the issue of how the program was likely to attract a pool of beneficiaries that had unsustainably high needs.