Conditions
Here’s something that occurred to me last night whilst falling asleep: what do the various new healthcare insurance reform bills say about pre-existing conditions? The standard view seems to be that insurance companies shouldn’t be able to deny claims on that basis, since it certainly does look bad on TV when someone appears and says “I had cancer, and Blue Cross Blue Shield wouldn’t cover my treatment!” because BCBS says “Oh, you had cancer before you signed up.” Obviously, if the person didn’t know she had cancer, that’s BS.
But it certainly is a problem for an insurance company if someone avoids getting coverage because they can’t afford it or just don’t feel like spending money on it, and then they find out they have a serious medical problem, and they sign up for healthcare to get free treatment. Obviously the company isn’t going to want to pay for this, and I’m not very excited about what it would do to the premiums of even a public plan. Since President Obama’s thoughts on the subject seem to be that no one is going to be forced to get healthcare, but that no one should be denied coverage based on having a pre-existing condition, what’s to stop me from just cancelling coverage on my entire family and then buying it when one of us gets sick?
Reading the above, you might think I’m against the public option. Not at all. I don’t think it goes far enough; I think we need single-payer, ideally in the French style, which allows for additional coverage to be purchased from private insurers (in the way many companies offer coverage to seniors to go along with Medicare). Unfortunately, that’s off the table.
Anybody have any answers?
