What Will Health Care Reform Mean For You?
Thursday, March 18th, 2010
Health care reform has been a real roller-coaster ride these past few months, but conventional wisdom says it will pass soon. If it does, millions of Americans will be able to get health insurance coverage who don’t have it now.
But what happens to people who already have insurance? If you are among the majority of people who get their insurance through employee benefits or other group plans — well, nothing much will happen at all, at least for a while.
That may surprise you. If you listen to some politicians, you might think that doctors are going to be rounded up and made to work in barbed-wire enclosed gulags. Patients would need permission from the Bureau of Rationed Health Care to get medical treatment, and Grandma would be hauled off the Soylent Green factory. And for this, your premiums would go up 500 percent.
But the truth is that if you are in a group insurance plan now, once health care reform is passed you’ll still be in the same group plan, and your doctor will still be your doctor, and he’ll work out of the same office he always did. And the Congressional Budget Office says there will be no significant change in group insurance premiums in the foreseeable future.
What a minute, you say. I keep hearing family premiums will go up 10 to 15 percent or more. Politicians who keep repeating that “fact” are not being honest. The CBO said that individual policies, meaning policies not purchased through a group, probably will get more expensive, but only because people will be able to purchase insurance with more options. The cost of group plans is not expected to change, however.
What if you aren’t happy with your group insurance? If you work for a small business, you may be able to purchase a policy through an insurance exchange. Your employer would contribute to the cost of the premiums, for which your employer could get a tax credit. This would enable you to choose among different policies and perhaps find a policy you like better than the one you have now. You would not be stuck with the one and only policy your employer provides.
Beginning in 2014, insurers will no longer be able to refuse coverage to someone because of pre-existing conditions. This means you will be able to change jobs without worrying about losing your insurance. If you have a child with health problems, the ban on refusing coverage will begin in only six months.
Further, in time insurers will no longer be able to drop your coverage if you get really sick. This practice is called “rescission.” If you are struck by a devastating disease such as asbestos cancer, today in most states your insurer can announce that you didn’t cross all the “Ts” on your application and drop your coverage just when you need it most. That will end.
Other changes: Lifetime coverage limits will be phased out. You will be able to keep your children on your policy until they reach the age of 26.
But for the most part, if you already have health insurance through a group plan, the medical care you receive now is not going to change. The big differences will be felt by people who don’t have insurance now, and I will go into that in other posts.
— Barbara O’Brien
