The Health Wonk Review is up at Health Care Policy and Marketplace Review. Jason from Healthcare Economist has an interesting post about whether we value money more when we’re healthy or when we’re sick. His article about the marginal utility of consumption and health has lots of detail about research that has been done on this issue. It makes for interesting reading - and note that there’s no level of optimal health insurance equal to zero. The fact remains that if you don’t have any health insurance at all, you’re going to run into some big problems if you do get seriously ill. And for 47 million Americans, that is a very real concern.

Roy, from Healthcare Renewal has an article about a hospital COO who has resigned after serious ethical questions have been raised - including allegations of embezzlement. I agree with Roy that a lot more oversight is needed in the administration of hospitals and pharmaceutical companies. In our efforts to contain ever-rising health care costs, the last thing we need is a bunch of executives using health care dollars for their own good.

InsureBlog’s Hank Stern has a post detailing his take on being underinsured. I agree with some of his points - mainly that you get what you pay for, and if people choose their health insurance policies primarily because of the price, there are some risk-management issues afoot that are going to come back to bite people. But, we have to remember that the general public knows very little about health insurance. In the health insurance industry we’re surrounded by plan description forms and rate increases. It’s easy to forget what we understood about health insurance before we got into the industry. So when a consumer goes looking for a health insurance policy, it’s the responsibility of those of us in the industry to clearly explain the ins and outs of the various options. Every health insurance policy - even the really cruddy ones - has a nice glossy brochure that details all the great points about the policy. Some will even mention how you’re getting a bargain by not paying for things you don’t need. Uh… how do you know what you will or won’t need, since the purpose of your policy is to guard against future unknows? So while I agree that some people knowingly purchase cut-rate health insurance in order to save money, I would also contend that a lot of people are led astray by fancy marketing, captive agents looking to make a sale, and a product that has gotten far more complicated than necessary. I believe that being underinsured is a very real problem, and one that people often don’t know about until they have a large claim. Policies with annual limits or low lifetime limits on benefits, and policies that don’t cover prescriptions or doctor visits - even after the deductible is met - are better than nothing but fall far short of really protecting ones assets.

The Colorado Health Insurance Insider post about McCain’s health care plans and individual health insurance was included in the HWR this week. Thanks for hosting, Bob!