Where to buy a health plan in 2014

I found out first hand what an awful mess the American healthcare system is in when I suffered an industrial accident which landed me in a burn ward for three months, crippled my right foot and took me out of the work force. Healthcare is pretty nice when your company qualifies for group rates, handles all the paperwork, and sees that you cannot be excluded for pre-existing conditions; but it is a living nightmare out there should you ever lose your job through sickness, injury, or other reasons and must scrounge for coverage in the private market.

In my case, my injury (though covered by workers comp) disqualifies me from obtaining general coverage in the private market At ANY PRICE.  I am deemed too great an unknown liability and there is no place for a person like me on their for-profit spread-sheets.  Fortunately I had no family to support and I had my life's savings to fall back on. It was only by drawing deeply on these reserves that I was able to find and keep any sort of coverage at all, just not through the private market.

The only way I could get insured was through the State's (yes, there is that hated 'nanny-state' again! Meddling in business affairs and trying to look out for people), I say the only way I could get insured was through the state's HIPAA program of guaranteed coverage, but even that was a touch and go proposition. One mistake, one returned letter and I would have been SOL. To qualify, you MUST exhaust your COBRA coverage without a lapse, beat the narrow window of qualification (thanks Nixon.) and squirm through all the other pit-falls and hoops in the way of obtaining coverage.

And even then, although the insurance company cannot refuse to cover you, they DO get to set the premiums; and in my case HumanOne jacked my rates up after the first year from $440 a month to $650 a month, an increase of 67% in a single year! In an effort, I suspect, to price undesirable clients out of the market before the first of the ObamaCare reforms hit. And indeed, after the mandate came on line that 80% of all premiums collected must be spent on actual health-care rather than profits, my health insurance rates fell back down to under $400 a month and I received a nice letter informing me that I may have a refund on the way.

The truth is that good people through no fault of their own are being slaughtered financially by the healthcare system in America every day. Indeed, one of the greatest cause of bankruptcy in America is when a family is stricken by serious illness and exhausts or losses coverage. That is you and me, my friend.

But while the GOP sought to stone-wall, dig in their heals and do everything in their power to see that no reforms were made, only the Democrats under Obama had the grit to tackle the issue and forge ahead.

And now that reform is a defacto reality, even the GOP (when not vowing to repeal ObamaCare), is actually talking about reform, about allowing the 25,000 dependents to stay on their parents plans, and not allowing the worst offenses of the Insurance Companies past such as revoking coverage on the feeblest of pretenses once someone gets seriously ill. This is progress friend. It is a place to start and a place from which we can proceed. No matter how the election turns out,this is a good thing and Obama deserves the credit.

-Science_1

I am not being critical of insurance, especially health insurance.  But, I am being crititcal of insurance as it seems to be in America now.  When you get close to 65, you will get almost daily one, two or more letters offering you the best insurance but you MUST Call today! Then, tomorrow you get more, and so on.  I have started sending back rude letters.  And, when you get the business reply envelopes, they usually go to a different address than the one that sent you the junk.  You also get offers of a reverse mortgage that in my opinion is designed to take your home. I think we need a national healtcare system but nothing like what we have today.  VOTE CONGRESS OUT!!! They allow direct marketing and then you get endless junk mail pressuring you to buy TODAY always AFFORDABLE!