Health Insurance Blog

Kaiser Permanente now offers a subsidized individual health insurance plan that costs as low as $20 per month.  The plan is called Bridge Community Health Plan.  The Bridge plan targets individuals and families who are experiencing tough times but make too much money to qualify for government sponsored programs like Medicare of Medicaid.

Kaiser Permanente subsidizes 90 to 95% of the monthly premium as a community benefit.

The Bridge Plan offers up to 3 years of comprehensive health coverage to qualified individuals & families.  Applicants must live in the Washington D.C. and Baltimore metropolitan areas.  To determine eligibility, interested parties can contact 866-456-5902.

As promised we will be breaking the US News and World Report health plan rankings down into the state level, to account for differences in health plan regulations, and mandated benefits in each state which can skew results.

According to the report:

The top 10 Ohio Health Plans are:

1. Summacare
2. Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield of Ohio
3. Paramount Health Care
4. Medical Mutual of Ohio
5. CIGNA Healthcare of Ohio
6. The Health Plan of the Upper Ohio Valley
7. Aetna Health of Ohio
8. Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Ohio
9. UnitedHealthcare of Ohio
10. Humana Health Plan of Ohio

We will be posting the top 10 health plans in each state over the next several weeks (3-5 states per day), so check back frequently if you don’t see your states health insurance rankings listed yet.

CEO of Kaiser Permanente, George Halverson recently weighed in on health care reform and what he thought would happen in the short term.

In summary, Mr. Halverson stated that he believes there is a very high likelihood that some level of health care reform will emerge from out of Washington as early as next year.  However, the possibility depends on which presidential candidate gets elected. If Republican candidate John McCain is elected he won’t have his own party in charge of Congress, so reform is less likely.  While It is a priority for the McCain campaign to get something passed as it relates to health care reform, it is a much higher priority for Dem. candidate Barack Obama.   Halverson believes there would be  a high likelihood that Obama would get something done relatively early in his administration if elected.