College Confidential - View Single Post - Health Insurance Firms paid employees bonuses for cancelling policies!

calmom · 11-16-2007, 07:32 PM

First of all, the plaintiff's health insurance was canceled when she was diagnosed with breast cancer - which has absolutely nothing to do with heart condition and very little to do with her weight. (At most, excess weight might be a risk factor for cancer - not a direct cause).

So there's not much "fraud" -- it is not as if she signed up for health insurance knowing she wanted gastric bypass surgery. Insurance policies routinely deny care for "pre-existing conditions", but in this case the purported nondisclosure is an unrelated condition.

But that gets to another issue entirely-- and why we need universal health care. The whole idea of denying someone medical care because they were sick before they got insurance is ridiculous -- is this person any less entitled to treatment for her breast cancer because she had a heart condition? For that matter, should she go without medical care for her lifetime for her heart condition (whatever it is) because she can't buy insurance for a "pre-existing condition"? If your kid has asthma do you want him or her to grow up to be uninsurable -- or only able to get medical care by paying monthly premiums that are unaffordable for any young person?

Obviously issues like excess weight and smoking are partly within the control of the patient, and it makes sense for insurance companies to offer incentives such as reduced premiums for those who work to stay healthy -- but it is unconscionable to let people go untreated for serious conditions like cancer simply because they can't afford the treatments -- and who can afford the cost of cancer treatment?

If we had universal health care --whether through a single-payer system or a regulated, hybrid system like the one that John Edwards & Hillary Clinton propose -- then this wouldn't be an issue. Health Net could play by the rules, or if they don't want to pay to treat sick people, they could opt out of the market.

A private system where only healthy people with few risks can be approved for insurance that they can afford is no system at all. It is simply a ripoff.

11-16-2007, 07:32 PM	#19
calmom Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 6,436	First of all, the plaintiff's health insurance was canceled when she was diagnosed with breast cancer - which has absolutely nothing to do with heart condition and very little to do with her weight. (At most, excess weight might be a risk factor for cancer - not a direct cause). So there's not much "fraud" -- it is not as if she signed up for health insurance knowing she wanted gastric bypass surgery. Insurance policies routinely deny care for "pre-existing conditions", but in this case the purported nondisclosure is an unrelated condition. But that gets to another issue entirely-- and why we need universal health care. The whole idea of denying someone medical care because they were sick before they got insurance is ridiculous -- is this person any less entitled to treatment for her breast cancer because she had a heart condition? For that matter, should she go without medical care for her lifetime for her heart condition (whatever it is) because she can't buy insurance for a "pre-existing condition"? If your kid has asthma do you want him or her to grow up to be uninsurable -- or only able to get medical care by paying monthly premiums that are unaffordable for any young person? Obviously issues like excess weight and smoking are partly within the control of the patient, and it makes sense for insurance companies to offer incentives such as reduced premiums for those who work to stay healthy -- but it is unconscionable to let people go untreated for serious conditions like cancer simply because they can't afford the treatments -- and who can afford the cost of cancer treatment? If we had universal health care --whether through a single-payer system or a regulated, hybrid system like the one that John Edwards & Hillary Clinton propose -- then this wouldn't be an issue. Health Net could play by the rules, or if they don't want to pay to treat sick people, they could opt out of the market. A private system where only healthy people with few risks can be approved for insurance that they can afford is no system at all. It is simply a ripoff.
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