Jim DeMint, common sense personified.
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Posted on 11/16/2010 2:35:12 AM PST by markomalley
In an interview with CNSNews.com on Monday at the “November Speaks” rally on Capitol Hill, sponsored by the conservative group Americans For Prosperity, DeMint said that forcing insurance companies to cover people with pre-existing conditions is not necessary.
“We don’t need to do that,” said DeMint. “We have examples of what they call high-risk pools at the state level that create an option for people with pre-existing conditions. A few states are doing that really well. What we need to do is multiply that over all the states.”
Apart from causing premiums to rise for all Americans to cover people with pre-existing conditions, as the Democrats’ legislation is already causing, DeMint said he would not go along with a plan to force insurers to cover those who were already sick, because similar mandates have been enacted in other nations, and they have failed.
“What we found in other countries is, once you do that, people don’t buy insurance until they’re sick,” said DeMint. “So that’s not something I’d support.”
In the “Pledge to America,” a set of promises to the American people laid down in writing prior to the November election, the House Republican leadership wrote that it would “ensure that those with pre-existing conditions gain access to the coverage they need.”
This pledge was made despite a repeated promise that congressional Republicans would repeal the Democrats’ health care bill in its entirety, including the pre-existing conditions mandate, as soon as repeal was possible.
It is unclear whether DeMint, who has often found himself at odds with the GOP Senate leadership, is on the same page as his Senate and House colleagues when it comes to assuring that individuals with pre-existing conditions can get access to health insurance.
DeMint addressed a crowd largely made up of Tea Party members, calling for congressional Democrats to refrain from pushing through a liberal agenda during the lame duck session of Congress.
DeMint was joined by Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-Minn.), Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and several newly elected Republican congressmen who will take their seats after Jan. 3, 2011.
“The only reason I’m here today – and a lot of you thanked me on the way in – is to thank you,” DeMint told the crowd. “What you’ve done is given us, me, Mike Pence, Michelle, others, the power to change things. Because the only power we have here in Washington is the power of ideas and the millions of people who are standing behind us.”
The problem is that there were already limitations on what insurance companies could do regarding pre-existing conditions and those limitations have been in place since the 90s, when HIPAA was passed. (IIRC, the pre-existing condition itself could only be excluded for either 6 months or one year...and then had to be covered)
When do the hearings on Obamacare waivers for Obama’s union bosses begin?
Tell DeMint its too late. Blue Cross has taken out preexisting conditions, limits on lifetime coverage, and more. The result is a $160 a month bill to insure a never-been-sick 19 year old college girl with a 5 times a year see the doctor for $30 policy with $2500 deductible. It’s almost easier to pay as you go save the college requires coverage.
Well, that’s if you have group. If you have private insurance you simply can’t get a policy, period, nada, no way, take it from me, LOL, been there, done that! Oh, you can get a policy to cover the medical stuff that doesn’t relate to the pre-existing condition, but the condition itself will not be covered.
But if you have group, and you maintain continuous coverage and don’t let a policy lapse (i.e. use cobra during job changes, etc.) then you will not be denied coverage...if there is a lapse there will usually be a 1 year denial of coverage for expenses related to the pre-existing condition (that can get a little iffy because an insurance company will deny anything it can possibly “link” to the illness, even if that might not be the case.)
But insurers still had the ability to turn people down for coverage, didn’t they?
Once again, DeMint is absolutely right. The rest of the GOP pols who say they want to repeal Obamacare and institute market reforms but still force insurers to take people regardless of preexisting conditions are demagoguing the issue.
I disagree. I’ve paid my employee share of employer health insurance for over 30 years. I had cancer surgery 5 years ago and have been pronounce cancer free at each of my annual checkups. My employer is considering dropping health insurance so I have been exploring private insurance. Each company I’ve spoken to has indicated it will not sell me a private policy due to my “pre-existing” condition.
I also have friends with health issues who retired in their 50’s and later experienced their employer dropping retiree health insurance prior to them reaching the Medicare eligibility age. Again, they found they could not purchase an individual policy.
Health insurance is not like auto insurance where you pay in for years, have an accident claim and continue the relationship with the company. The absence of portability, and a requirement for continuation beyond the 18 months of COBRA does result in people who have played by the rules and paid into they system ending up without coverage due to unemployment.
I agree the requirement that companies cover pre-existing conditions will open the door to abuse by people who choose not to purchase insurance until they have the need. However, that potential for abuse does not negate the very real situation today where unemployment or the dropping of insurance by and employer can result in people who have played by the rules and paid into the system for decades, and who have the ability and willingness to pay for an individual insurance policy, ending up without the ability to purchase insurance at all.
According to your age, ObamaCare would probably not treat you anyway. They want you outa here if you are over 45.
My sister has a pre-existing condition (HHT) for which she had surgery 5 years ago and could possibly have future problems, and she cannot change her insurance. She has a high deductible individual plan ($20,000) that hardly covered any of her surgery because she had to go to an HHT center that was not in her network. She has tried several times to get a different plan, that would cover more of potential future surgeries, but when she fills out the health questionnaire, she is denied. So she has a plan that will not cover the specialists she needs, does not have specialists for her condition, and can’t get a different plan. I don’t know the answer, I am against all this government intervention. But I haven’t heard a free-market solution for this problem yet.
One guy with a brain. You can not get insurance after a fire. A better way must be found. Indigents can get medicaid. Rule changes are needed. There is no reason people who have TV and Cell phones can not pay for catastrophic coverage.
Solution...Eliminate employer based coverage.
Portability might be one solution. If you enter the “system” and pay for coverage, as long as you maintain coverage you are covered whether that policy is partially or fully paid by an employer or paid by the individual.
In the new economy, where employment is frequently at risk, few will work an entire career at one company. The reality of today’s world is most employees will switch companies multiple times in a career and will periodically experience periods of unemployment or possibly involuntary retirement due to health reasons. The current “system” was designed in a world where people stayed with one employer for their entire career and the risk of going without insurance or being denied coverage was much smaller.
Government managed single payer health care gains support for this very reason. The private answer would be the individual purchasing a health insurance policy at the start of one’s career. Employer could subsidize all or part of that payment during ones employment. When the employee leaves the employer, the policy goes with the employee with the premiums to be paid by the citizen or the next employer. It would be the choice of the employer whether or not to contribute to an employee’s health insurance, in the same way it is the employer’s choice whether or not to provide a pension plan.
In a true free market, the amount of health insurance one carries would be up to the individual in the same way the amount one saves for retirement is a personal choice. Employers would have the same freedom of choice in a free market. Some might choose to compete by subsidizing health insurance premiums (the same concept as a 401K match or funded pension plan). Other employers might choose to only pay wages without any health insurance subsidy. The competitive marketplace for labor would dictate how the employer designs its total compensation package, including or not including health care insurance.
Individual ownership of health insurance policies would allow them to be portable. With portability would have to come a national market for health insurance policies as opposed to the current system of insurance being offered and regulated at the state level.
Community rating and guarantee issue may work.
Offering individual insurance with the same rules as group insurance would do the trick. Community underwriting, guaranteed issue and rates based on geographical experience with no pre existing limitations after 1 year. Those who choose to self insure will just have to pay the piper or end up on medicaid. It is really pretty simple.
Jim DeMint, common sense personified.
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I think the one thing that is driving up cause is unnecessary demand being placed on the health care system, especially by those people who use the ER as their private, personal 24-hour-a-day on-call doctor’s office. If more of these people were made to pay for these services (i.e., have the costs deducted from their welfare benefits), then there wouldn’t be a need for health care providers to charge paying customers so much money, and insurance prices could come down as a result.
Next the fed will mandate that Car Insurance allow you to buy into a policy AFTER you have an accident... with full comprehensive coverage before the check is deposited.
LLS
If you and they are profitable risks, some company in a freed up market will take you on. If you are not, then in reality your healthcare will need to be subsidized and we might as well subsidize it directly instead of ruining good markets to obscure the fact.
I. Repeal or cripple National Health Care
II. Tort Reform
III. Allow for purchase across state lines (and other free market enticements)
IV. Eliminate pre-existing condition declinations and unreasonable rates based on pre-x.
a. Require Credible Coverage for 6- 12 months to encourage compliance and reduce adverse selection…
i. For non-compliance (people who wait to get insurance until they are diagnosed with an illness) have a 6-12 month waiting period for coverage to kick in on pre-x (like Texas state risk pool).
ii. Treat any benefits paid during 6-12 month period as income to be taxed at normal rates. Or…turn them away if no ability to pay.
iii. Fines and penalties for people with no insurance who buy insurance at onset of condition.
b. Government acts as reinsurer for industry on problematic pre-existing cases.
i. Place people with problematic pre-existing conditions in a “Special” category. For those cases, government subsidizes cost of care at end of each year so that Insurer “breaks even” on those particular cases thus eliminating the resistance to issuing coverage on these people.
ii. Healthy people (or ones with minor pre-existing) are underwritten as they always have been and create the profits (or loss) traditionally achieved by Industry.
iii. Medicaid remains safety net for very poor- strictly monitored and adjusted, heavy fines/prison for fraud
Probably the only way you could get a handle on Medicaid/Medicare fraud would be a bounty system with large cash rewards for whistle blowers.
The current approach is a total failure.
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