Insurance companies can no longer deny coverage
It is likely sometime in your life that you, or someone you know, have been denied insurance coverage due to a pre-existing condition. According to a report recently released by the U.S Department of Health and Human Services:
"12.6 million non-elderly adults - 36 percent of those who tried to purchase health insurance directly from an insurance company in the individual insurance market - were in fact discriminated against because of a pre-existing condition in the previous three years."
To make matters worse, even if an individual is able to gain coverage, insurance companies are still able to water down your coverage due to your determined pre-existing condition. For example:
"[S]omeone with a pre-existing condition of hay fever could have any respiratory system disease - such as bronchitis or pneumonia - excluded from coverage."
For the millions of Americans who have had to suffer under this discriminatory system, the passage of health reform is a true blessing. Insurance companies will no longer be able to turn down Americans for coverage based on their pre-existing condition, health status, gender or age.
Within the first 6 months of enactment, insurance companies will no longer be able to discriminate against children with pre-existing conditions; and by 2014 they will be prohibited from refusing coverage to anyone based on their medical history or health status. Until then, the federal government will provide insurance for those with pre-existing conditions through a national high-risk pool, or they will provide federal dollars to already established state high-risk pools to allow them to take in more participants.
There are many aspects of our health care system that make you want to scream, but the fact that insurance companies have been able to deny people access to care, simply because they happened to get sick in their past is one that has outraged many Americans for years. Thankfully, the new health reform law will make this injustice a thing of the past.
Comments
Scott B.
Samantha
Mark
Erin
According to our policy experts, this should not be the case. If you bought the plan after the rule took effect, you should not be in this situation. If you bought it before the rule took effect (what's known as a "grandfathered plan"), they could still exclude some pre-existing conditions. We would recommend that you contact your insurance department to ask if your insurance plan is violating the law. You can find your state's insurance department contact info by clicking on your state here: http://www.naic.org/state_web_map.htm
Joe
Joe
Erin
If you're in a state that does not have a consumer assistance program, you can look up a legal services organization to find out about your rights. Here's our Guides to Finding Health Coverage at http://www.familiesusa.org/resources/resources-for-consumers/finding-coverage-2009.html.
Patrick
Erin
That will change in 2014. Then, plans won't be able to charge more based on health. Right now, the Pre-existing condition insurance plan, which is for people with preexisting conditions who have been uninsured 6 months or more, also has to charge standard rates - the same rates that health plans generally charge healthy people. But unfortunately, in most states, other plans still can charge higher premiums to people with preexisiting conditions health until 2014.
osama
Dee W
Gloria W
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