Why Should Insurance Companies Be Required Cover People With Preexisting Conditions?

I think there should be no requirement that insurance companies cover people with preexisting medical conditions. An insurance company should be able to choose who to cover and for how much in order to make a profit.

Forcing insurance companies to cover those with preexisting conditions simply forces up the premiums for those with no major health problems.

You can always find an insurance company to cover you if you are willing to pay enough. I ran into this problem when I was trying to get car insurance within a year after my wife was in two serious fenderbenders (both of them her fault) and was ticketed twice in a month.

Naturally it was difficult, but eventually GEICO agreed to cover us and as the years passed with no further driving incidents, our rates steadily declined.

 

Take me for example. I had cancer a few years ago. Now while I have health insurance, if I lost it and picked up a new insurance plan, I wouldn't be covered for cancer should it return. Is that fair?

I can't even get a life insurance policy with the cancer- no one will take me- not even for a small plan that covers just the burial! I have to wait another 10 years then find some sort of insurance for seniors... one of those "no exam required, coverage guaranteed" deals.

 

Insurance companies ought not exist--health coverage should be provided under a single-payer universal program. However, since they do exist, they ought to be required to provide coverage to anyone who's willing to pay.

The whole point of insurance is to aggregate risk--so that is can be distributed evenly over a larger pool. What's the point in health insurance if you can't get covered?

No, you can't. Moreover, you can't really expect people making $8/hour to fork over "as much as required" premiums. This is why private health insurance doesn't work.

States require car insurance companies to cover anyone who asks; that's why they will adjust premiums to account for high risk individuals. Until Obamacare, there was no such requirement for health insurance companies--they would simply refuse to cover people with preexisting conditions.

Which is not how health insurance worked. You simply flat out would not be covered for that condition for any price.

 

Because they benefit from those with no preexisting conditions and sustained excellent health.

The problem with our PRESENT system (which will ultimately be changed) is that WE spend inordinate amounts of money, to bolster the wealth of a few... rather than provide the healthcare that people NEED overall.

I've been VERY healthy for over 50 years of my life; my medical bills have been minimal. So, I'm sure the several tens of thousands of dollars I've paid over time for health insurance, was great profit for a few. Easy money.

Now, there are millions of people like me who pay and essentially do not cash-in until much later in life. Of course, when we get older we get either get sick or die. I know that the "coverage" should not be "FREE", but it SHOULD be available for all. Therefore everyone should pay. All will eventually need some form of healthcare; some, more of it than others.

Preexisting conditions?? Look, we either set up a humane system where all are eligible to receive healthcare... or we clearly and honestly decide to provide a way for those people to die with dignity. Even so, letting insurance companies do what they want, will surely lead to the latter.

After all, the job of commercial organizations is to make MONEY, not necessarily CARE about people. If anything, the TAX BREAKS and SUBSIDIES should go to those healthcare corporations which provide care to the most seriously-ill Americans.

In fact, I'm writing my Congressmen about that this week. What a GREAT IDEA: The more sick people you take care of, and the higher the quality of care... the greater that corporation's tax incentives.

 

The change laws regarding health care insurance to be the same as car insurance.

As for life insurance. Who cares about it anyway?

 

Healthcare is a mess, so I really don't see the issue with saying that anyone should be able to be covered. It's entirely possible for you to develop symptoms of something while being unable to get healthcare thus unable to go and have it checked out at a reasonable cost. Also why would you want to. What if it turns out you have cancer? Good lucking getting health insurance then. Insurance is so expensive the average person cannot afford it other than through work (with their job paying massively out the ass for them).

Even then not everyone can afford their jobs offered insurance. My old security company is an example. At $10 an hour they wanted me to pay about $150 a month for insurance, with $500 per person I wanted to have covered under my insurance. My take home after taxes was around 1200 a month. I'd say paying over 10% of my earnings per month on a health related gamble is a bit excessive wouldn't you? Infact if we took what I was paying and why my employer was likely paying (I'd say together it adds up to $500 atleast) and put that into a health savings account I'd have had $6000 at the end of the year for health expenses. Instead I have 0 because I quit that job years ago and have recently gone from student to unemployed. Guess where my health insurance comes from!

So to sum it up while I'm usually pretty much free market I can't really fault government for doing things like forcing coverage for pre-existing conditions. Fact is our health system is a mess for anyone not working a steady job at reasonable pay. Clearly Obama care isn't the answer (forcing people to buy insurance does nothing but make the situation worse), and I'm not sure that there is a fully private solution to the issue. Healthcare should be seen as infrastructure; everyone should have access to it just as they do water, power, roads, etc.

 

That's what Obamacare did! And the conservatives are up in arms over it.

 

Why shouldn't life insurance companies be able to drop old people. Old people die and cut into their profits and make life insurance more expensive for those of us who are younger.

 

I agree that there should be a single payer insurance for at least the basic care and catastrophic care which we will all need at some point in our life. Then there could be some additional private insurance for people who want and can afford the elective procedures, a sort of self-paid cadillac plan

 

Yeah, and they shouldn't be required to cover people who drive in cars either, because people are more likely to die in cars, and that cuts into their profits and makes life insurance more expensive for everyone who doesn't.

 

The question is, why should insurance companies get to dictate who lives and who dies all in the name of profit. That's why the public option is the best way to go. Let people with money opt out of the public plan and pay their own private insurers and go to their own private doctors.

The rest of the poor people can pool their money together and use public hospitals.

 

The widespread practice of insurance has driven up medical costs for everyone. So I think it's pretty morally justifiable.

 

I don't actually wish you develop a "Preexisting Condition" but can't help but feel that you deserve to.

 

I have no problem with the government insisting on coverage of pre existing conditions, as long as the government picks up the tab for treatment.

 

The thing is, considering the mandate stands and the plan is fully implemented... Someone can easily say screw it, pay the $90 per year penalty, and if diagnosed with something serious, then buy the insurance. Pre-existing condition, no problem, big brother will force the insurance company to take you anyway!!

Win, win for everyone...except the taxpayer and the ins. company.

LOL

In my opinion it's total bull.

 

This is one area where I question the humanity of voluntary action. Sorry...

 

Our current healthcare problems are directly related to government. Insurance is supposed to be a way to hedge yourself from the possibility of having a very expensive health problem. Instead Insurance is used as a pay for everything one goes to the doctor for and at the same time they want it to stay inexpensive. Government has shaped this system and now as it fails wants to take it over completely, hardly surprising really.

The best system imho would be private insurance for catastrophic care, bought individually not through employers. People would take better care of themselves if they had to pay for it directly and healthy habits meant lower rates. If one wanted coverage for smaller things like broken arms, physicals, etc they can pay extra to cover that. But the cost for just catastrophic care would be relatively low, especially compared to todays rates as it isn't used often. In fact I would never have used it at all in my life yet. Anyway back to my plan.. Let people set up health savings accounts with the money put into them is not taxed. Employers could offer matching contributions, or something like that as benefits in lieu of insurance, which means that it wouldn't disappear if you lost your job. People can then use these accounts to pay for ER visits, physicals, preventative care, etc. the cheaper stuff.

This would have many benefits. It would reduce the cost of healthcare, first by getting rid of dealing with insurance companies for the vast majority of hospital visits, meaning less overhead for hospitals as they now need an army of paper pushers just to deal with all the insurance and medicare and medicaid paper work.

People would use healthcare more efficiently since they are directly related to costs. Far less people would just go to the more expensive ER when its possible to wait and just make an appointment. When the insurance company covers it why wait even if its no big deal?

Many unnecessary defensive tests wouldn't be run because people wouldn't want to pay for them. Freeing up more healthcare resources which would help to lower costs.

People would start shopping around for Dr.s who price stuff cheaper creating more competition in the healthcare industry. This would help push the market toward greater efficiency and lower prices (much like Laser eye surgery). If you are going to get a physical, you call one Dr and find he charges $100 while another charges $75, where are you going to go?

To get down to it healthcare is a limited resource the best way to deal with limited resources is to allow competition and to make sure the end user is connected to the costs, what we have now is not even close to that so I am not surprised our healthcare industry is so expensive and inefficient.

 

It's only when you are young that you can't conceive being old.
If you take that attitude and grow to be old, it's then all to late to take any type of avoiding action.

 

All of which is a powerful argument for a public single payer system, preferably paid for from taxes.

The business of covering illness and accidents should not be left to private enterprise. It is concerned only about increasing profit and reducing risk. That automatically means it will attempt to exclude certain groups and punitively levy others.

Health access and private enterprise are simply not compatible.

 

I and my wife HAVE preexisting conditions.

You lose.

 

Not really. HC companies where I live cannot up my policy payments due to pre-existing coonditions, so I win and you lose really.

Ta.

 

I think they should be required to accept people with pre existing conditions. What if someone who couldn't afford insurance before, now could but were not covered because in the time they were not covered, became ill?

I realise there may be many people with pre existing illnesses wanting coverage, but if they are willing to pay to be covered, doesn't the insurance company win in the end?

 

Hell yes. And insurance companies should not be able to refuse you fire insurance because your house in in flames. And, why shouldn't you be able to get life insurance on your terminally ill grandfather at a rate set by the government that hates insurance companies anyway...unless they're owned bu Buffett.

 

I can't get insurance. I'm over 65, am not elibible for Medicare and no insurance company will cover me. Thanks, Big Government. Of course, I'm going to be fined by the government if I don't buy the government health insurance, Medicare, out of my own pocket. It's not fair.

Actually, it's not fair some people get cancer and some don't. Some are destined from birth to have cancer. That's not fair, either. Some don't even get a chance to be born. That's not fair.

Oh, woe is me, it's not fair.

 

Medical care will always come at some cost to society. Still, it is an essential service, right up there with law enforcement and national defense.

In my view, the key is getting the MOST from the money we spend. There are many arguments for/against what more socialized nations have implemented as healthcare systems... but surely the U.S.A. can/should do better.