Health Insurance Blog

Humana Health Insurance’s website has useful health and wellness articles including one in particular entitled “Couch Potatoes - Here’s Food for Thought”.  This article is encouraging members to exercise for many different reasons. 

The article points out that being a “couch potato” can be deadly.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the underlying causes of deadly diseases can often be prevented by lifestyle changes.  The American Diabetes Association states that 300,000 deaths a year are because of obesity related illnesses.  Small changes in your lifestyle may extend your life.

In the article it discusses the high cost of living an unhealthy life with no exercise.  High blood pressure, obesity, high cholesterol, and diabetes are expensive to treat.  There are high costs associated with pills, tests, medical procedures and other high-tech services.  In many cases, the healthier you are, the lower your Humana quotes will be.  It’s encouraging to know that our health is mostly in our hands, but it takes dedication and consistency over time to see significant changes.

The Senate Finance Committee is coming close to figuring out a healthcare reform bill according to Maggie Guo’s article on The Ethiopian Review site.  Health care cooperatives are still on the table, which has the idea of building large groups so that the price of expensive medical costs are spread out among members to reduce costs for everyone.

But Consumer Watchdog says this will not necessarily lower health insurance quotes for consumers.  They say that in practice there has not been enough members for cooperatives to carry out their function and people with less medical risk often opt out of joining. 

For a cooperative to be effective, member enrollment would need to be near 500,000 consumers according to some estimates.  There have been attempts in Texas, Florida and Colorado without much success.  There is also the concern that if small states get together to create bigger groups, then health insurance companies may insist on a suspension of state regulations because of the different types of customers they would be serving.  This would in turn cause a whole new type of oversight and possibly a lack of proper regulation. 

Approximately 1 million Americans have been infected with the H1N1 virus, more commonly known as the swine flu, according to the article “Individual Health Insurance Could Provide Assistance for Swine Flu Vaccines” by Maggie Guo found on the Ethiopian Review. 

People who are covered by certain individual health insurance companies may have the swine flu vaccine paid for.  Anthem Blue Cross is covering their customers who carry vaccine coverage and America’s Health Insurance Plans says it will offer similar protections according to a St. Louis Post-Dispatch report.

Once the Food and Drug Administration approves treatment there will be roughly 160 million doses of innoculations according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Clinical trials are currently in progress.  Across the country, cities are establishing free clinics to give vaccines.  There will be 100 centers in NYC alone in addition to a center at each elementary school.  Chicago and LA are following similar plans.

Residents living in Dallas County, TX are eligible for a unique Dallas health insurance perk.  Dallas County’s prescription drug card covers pet’s medicines as well, according to the article on examiner.com by Rebecca Poling. 

The Dallas County Coast2Coast RX card offers huge savings on prescription drugs, up to 65%.  This includes pet prescriptions also.  There are no health restrictions nor are there any age or income requirements.  Both brand name and generic drugs are covered under this program. 

WalMart, Kroger, Walgreens, CVS, Sam’s Club, Target, Tom Thumb, Costco, Minyard and others are all participating pharmacies of the Dallas County Coast2Coast RX Card.  This card can mean big savings if you live in the eligible area.

The Texas Health Insurance Pool website gives some history and background to what the pool is and how it benefits Texas residents.

The Texas Legislature created the Texas Health Insurance Pool to provide Texas health insurance benefits to eligible Texans who are unable to get coverage from commercial insurance companies because of previous or current medical conditions. 

The Pool is also an alternative means for individual health insurance coverage which guarantees transferring coverage to qualified residents who lose their coverage under an employer based plan, a church plan, or a state plan.  This is mandated by the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, also known as HIPPAA.

The article “Leading insurance grievance: delays in claims handling” by Becky Yerak on chicagotribune.com states that Illinois consumers have been filing less complaints about their health, auto and homeowners insurance companies. 

Illinois health insurance complaints were down 13%, auto insurance complaints were down 10%, and homeowners insurance was down 5%.  The complaint ratios, which compare the number of complaints with every $1 million in policies, vary widely among insurance companies.

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners released the study showing that the leading complaint was because of delays in handling of claims at 18.7%.  The next most common complaint was claims denials which was around 18.2%. 

Consumers complained most often about accident and health insurance coverage at 37.5% of complaints.  Auto insurance accounted for about 35% and homeowners insurance only accounted for 12.5% of all of the complaints.

Blue Cross Blue Shield health insurance companies’ anti fraud investigations caused savings and recoveries of about $350 million for 2008 according to the article “Blue Cross And Blue Shield Companies’ Anti-Fraud Efforts Recover $350 Million In 2008″ found on BCBS’s website. 

According to data released from Blue Cross Blue Shield National Anti-Fraud Department, this is a 43% increase from 2007.  The number of cases opened increased by about 34% and closed cases increased by 43% from 2007 to 2008. 

Approximately 3% of all health care spending is lost to fraud each year according to The National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association.  This totals to about $68 billion in losses.  The total savings for all BCBS companies’ anti fraud units and Special Investigative Units was around $7 for every $1 spent on anti fraud efforts.  BCBS is a leader in detecting and following up with fraud according to Scott P. Serota, BCBSA president and CEO.

About eight out of ten Americans favor a public option health insurance plan on the table in Congress right now.  This is according to the new poll underwritten by AARP and completed by Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates released Tuesday night at an AARP event in Denver. 

While most people seem to favor this public option, only four out of ten can accurately define what a public option health insurance plan means.  This is not good news for President Obama who may be facing possible defeat on his health care reform platform. 

The poll surveyed 1,000 Republicans, Democrats and independents across the nation earlier in August.  The survey does suggest that Americans agree on health care reform of some sort, but there is much less agreement on whether or not it’s worth higher taxes or higher health insurance rates. 

Most are still very concerned about having affordable health insurance.  65% oppose tax increases and 73% oppose higher health insurance premiums.  This information was found through the Wichita Business Journal in the article “AARP polling shows uncertainties about ‘public option’ insurance in health reform” by Neil Westergaard. 

If you are a North Carolina resident and have received any recent health insurance quotes, you know rates are way up.  They are up an astonishing 97% since 2000 according to an article on bizjournals.com by James Gallagher.  Income in the state has only increased by a mere 18.4% during the same time period. 

This information was obtained from a new study completed by Families USA released Tuesday.  If this trend continues more and more families will drop their health insurance because they will be unable to afford the costs.  The cost to obtain North Carolina health insurance for a family has gone from $6,649 to $13,083. 

In regards to employer sponsored health plans, more of the cost has been shifted to the employees as prices have gone up.  Employers covered about 73% of health insurance costs back in 2000, but by 2009 it’s down to approximately 67%.  Part of this decline is due to small business dropping their coverage altogether because they could not afford the benefit. 

Families USA supports health coverage for all and they conclude that the steep rate increase can be attributed to rising health-care spending, not enough competition in the industry, a lack of regulation from the government and cost shifting from those without insurance to those who are covered.

Congress may be backing away from their idea of a public option only health insurance plan.  The New York Times reported earlier today that public health insurance may not be included in their plan at all according to Sheryl Gay Stolberg on the NY Time’s site. 

White House officals state that President Obama hasn’t fully put aside the idea of a government only plan, but the door has been opened.  The president still believes there is great value in having a purely government plan, but he views it as only a small piece of a broader goal.  Ultimately the initiative is to control costs, make coverage available to as many people as possible, and make health care a much more efficient program. 

President Obama envisions the public health insurance option as a flexible plan backed by the government where consumers can buy public or private individual health insurance based on what fits their needs most.  Over time the plan would be financially self sustaining and require no additional subsidies.  But there is fear that this would drive private insurers out of business over time.