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The problem with high risk pools

Posted by: Colleen Haller on Mar 05, 2010

If I learned anything from the Summit last week, it was this: Democrats and Republicans agree that denying health coverage to people based on pre-existing conditions is wrong and should be stopped. However, while the Democrats' plan will ban insurers from these pre-existing condition exclusions, the Republican plan does not. Why doesn't the rhetoric match the policy?

Well, under House Minority Leader Boehner's plan, people with pre-existing conditions could get coverage in high-risk pools. These pools offer a safety net for people who are uninsurable in the private market. Unfortunately, high-risk pools aren't quite the "silver bullet" Republicans would have us believe they are. Without a large number of healthy people in the pool, premiums are much higher for policies sold to healthy people in the open market. In fact, according to Jonathan Cohn's recent article,

Premiums in the high-risk pools are anywhere from 125 to 200 percent of standard premiums.

How can the Republicans claim to care about people with pre-existing conditions while forcing them to pay double for their health insurance premiums?! High-risk pools are a good way to get people with pre-existing conditions some immediate security until the insurance exchanges are up and running, but in the long run, high-risk pools mean separate and unequal.

For Cohn, coverage offered in high risk pools,

ends up as second-class insurance, which really shouldn't be acceptable unless you think the people in them are second-class Americans.

I don't. That's why I'm ready for comprehensive health reform that will produce results, not rhetoric.