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Colorado Health Insurance Insider

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Cover Colorado

Decline And Rate Up Statistics – Interesting But Confusing

September 12, 2011 By Louise Norris

[…] Your policy will cost the same amount regardless of whether you use a broker, but an experienced broker will be able to help you make sense of the plan comparison information, including the underwriting statistics. A policy or carrier’s statistical likelihood of declining or rating up any one application isn’t really relevant to each specific client… what is relevant however, is each carrier’s underwriting guidelines for the particular pre-existing condition the applicant has. […]

Filed Under: Anthem Blue Cross, Cigna, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Rocky Mountain, United Healthcare

Low Enrollment And Adverse Selection In High Risk Pools

September 7, 2011 By Louise Norris

[…]CoverColorado – the high risk pool that Colorado has had in place since the early 90s – instead allows eligible applicants to enroll as soon as they are without another coverage option, but makes them wait to receive coverage for pre-existing conditions if they have been uninsured prior to applying. That system encourages people to sign up as soon as they are eligible rather than waiting until they need care. It would seem that the federally-funded high risk pools might be able to boost their enrollment and also avoid adverse selection by switching to a similar eligibility model.

Filed Under: Health Care Goodies, Health Care Reform

COBRA Subsidies Coming To An End

August 25, 2011 By Louise Norris

[…] The subsidy program was extended to help people who were involuntarily terminated on or before May 31, 2010, and allowed them to receive up to 15 months of COBRA premium assistance. For most people who qualified for the subsidies, the 15 months has already ended. But for the last people who qualified – those who were laid off in the final days of May, 2010 – the 15 months of premium assistance will come to an end next week. […]

Filed Under: COBRA, Health Care Reform

Healthcare Topics In The Cavalcade Of Risk

August 12, 2011 By Louise Norris

[…] Some lawmakers have proposed making people pay higher deductibles or doing away with first-dollar coverage on Medigap policies, with the idea being that if people have more of their own money on the table, they would be less likely to over-utilize non-essential healthcare. The problem, of course, is that seniors who are already struggling to pay for healthcare would be more likely to skip necessary care if they had to come up with additional money to pay for it. […]

Filed Under: Health Care Reform, Medicare, Medigap

430 People Already Enrolled In GettingUsCovered

November 18, 2010 By Louise Norris

[…] Even when policies are free or very low cost (such as Medicaid or Child Health Plan Plus), a significant number of eligible individuals continue to go without coverage, for a myriad of reasons. So it stands to reason that plenty of uninsured people who are eligible for GettingUsCovered won’t apply. Some likely aren’t aware of the availability, and many others simply can’t afford to pay the premiums. But apparently Colorado is enrolling people at a fairly fast pace – as of November 1, there were 20 states that had fewer than 50 people enrolled in their newly-created high risk pools.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Insurance Companies, Rocky Mountain

Funding Cover Colorado

November 10, 2010 By Louise Norris

For nearly two decades, Cover Colorado has been providing health insurance to people in Colorado who don’t have access to group health insurance coverage and have pre-existing conditions the make them uninsurable (or unable to get coverage without exclusion riders or rate increases that put their premium above that offered by Cover Colorado) in the individual health insurance market. While we’re lucky to have such a resource, it doesn’t come cheap […]

Filed Under: Group Health, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Insurance Companies

High Risk Pool Eligibility

October 27, 2010 By Louise Norris

[…] There is another significant difference between Cover Colorado and GettingUsCovered, in terms of eligibility. Both plans allow eligibility for applicants who have one of several specific medical conditions, and both plans accept applicants who have either been declined by a private insurance company or offered coverage with a pre-existing condition exclusion. But while Cover Colorado also allows people to enroll if they have been offered a private policy with a rate that is higher than a comparable Cover Colorado plan, GettingUsCovered does not allow this option. […]

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

CBS Story Leaves Out Important Options For Kids

September 23, 2010 By Jay Norris

[…] As I said, I have no knowledge of this particular family’s situation. But child-only policies have always been rare, and there is usually another option for those children to obtain coverage. They can be covered as a dependent on a parent’s policy (which can now include policies in the individual market), by Cover Colorado, or possibly by Medicaid or CHP+. Even situations like Thomas Wilkes, who was maxing out the lifetime caps, now has a solution because Healthcare Reform has removed lifetime maximums. There is a long way to go, and this situation is frustrating. But if you ever hear anybody say that they have no options to get their child covered in Colorado, please pass this information along. I hope that Mr. Serrano signs Maria up for some health insurance today, whether it is on a family policy with him, Cover Colorado, or CHP+. We should not be hearing anymore stories about uninsured children simply because their parents aren’t aware of the options available.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

Early Retiree Reinsurance Program Proving Very Popular

August 31, 2010 By Louise Norris

Earlier this summer, HHS announced that businesses could begin submitting applications to the newly-created Early Retiree Reinsurance Program in order to receive federal funding to help pay for retirees’ health insurance until they become eligible for Medicare. To date, 2000 businesses have been approved for the program, and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius says that this is just the beginning. Businesses have shown great interest in the reinsurance program… […]

Filed Under: Group Health, Individual/Family Health, Medicare

New High Risk Pool Unveiled Today In Colorado

July 6, 2010 By Louise Norris

[…] It’s nice to see Colorado leading the way in terms of using the federal high risk pool money to set up a new program for people with pre-existing conditions. Whether the money will hold out until 2014 remains to be seen, but at least we are now well on our way to having one more option for people in Colorado who can’t qualify for private health insurance.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

Some Confusion Around New Colorado High Risk Pool

July 3, 2010 By Louise Norris

The new Colorado health insurance program for people with pre-existing conditions is supposed to become available next week, but there seems to still be a lot of confusion about how it’s going to work. Since Colorado already has a policy available for people with pre-existing conditions (Cover Colorado), we are one of the states that is opting to use the federal money to set up another risk pool for applicants who cannot qualify for medically underwritten individual policies […]

Filed Under: Health Care Goodies, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Rocky Mountain

Not All States Have A Guaranteed Issue Option

December 1, 2009 By Louise Norris

[…] High risk pools are definitely better than nothing, but they don’t solve all insurance problems for people who have pre-existing conditions, and they don’t exist at all in some states. One of the aims of reform ought to include truly making health insurance available – in all states – to all applicants who want to purchase it. If we make all health insurance policies guaranteed issue (without also significantly expanding the pool of healthy insureds via a strong mandate), we’ll likely see higher costs for all insureds. But a good start would be to make sure that everyone, regardless of where they live, has access to at least one guaranteed issue health insurance policy (and no, discount plans and limited benefit policies don’t count).

Filed Under: COBRA, Group Health, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

What Guaranteed Issue Without A Mandate Looks Like

October 26, 2009 By Louise Norris

[…] Yes, companies like Wellpoint are in business to make a profit. But that doesn’t mean that everything they say in the health care reform debate should be dismissed. If we don’t make sure that everyone becomes part of the health insurance pool, we’ll likely be looking at fewer health insurance companies and far higher premiums after a few years of guaranteed issue policies.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

Expanding Access To Cover Colorado

October 13, 2009 By Louise Norris

I have often wondered about the feasibility of Cover Colorado expanding their eligibility to attract healthier applicants and perhaps improve their loss ratio. The state high risk pool health insurance policy – has claims expenses that far exceed premiums collected. Fees on private health insurance companies and a grant from Medicare help to make up the difference. […]

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Insurance Companies

Differing Opinions On Health Care Reform

August 24, 2009 By Louise Norris

[…] What makes this story different from most of the other ones out there is that Loralee got to speak with Valerie Jarrett at BlogHer last month, and has written a very detailed post about the experience. Loralee describes herself as a moderate Republican, but is very much in support of health care reform as proposed by the current administration. […]

Filed Under: Health Care Goodies, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

The Counter Productive Death Panel Concept

August 22, 2009 By Louise Norris

[…] There are two sides to the health care debate, and plenty of misconceptions. Genuine access to health care for all Americans is vitally important. But so are the financial implications – both on a personal and national level – of any health care reform bill. To discredit either side flippantly is disingenuous, but so is using terms like “death panel” to incite fear and anger instead of rational discourse.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

State Versus Federal Regulation Of Health Insurance

July 8, 2009 By Louise Norris

Marcy Morrison, the Colorado insurance commissioner, has made it clear that she supports keeping insurance regulation at a state level. The creation of a Health Choices Commissioner is part of the reform bill drafted by House Democrats, and would basically duplicate a lot of the responsibilities currently handled by state insurance commissioners. […]

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Insurance Companies

HB 1256 Not Really A Benefit To Consumers

February 9, 2009 By Louise Norris

[…] The Colorado Insurance Commissioner regulates the health insurance market in Colorado to make it as beneficial as possible for consumers. Opening the health insurance market to allow for out of state plans to be sold here in Colorado would mean that consumers might end up with lower quality health insurance products, regulated by another state’s rules. […]

Filed Under: Health Care Goodies, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health

The Failings Of The Free Market In Health Care

November 20, 2008 By Louise Norris

At the Colorado Health Insurance Insider, we’ve often written about the “free market” in health care. In our corner of the industry, there’s really only a free market for the healthiest of applicants. Those with pre-existing conditions can’t get some polices no matter how much they’re […]

Filed Under: Individual/Family Health

Leaving a Four Year Old Kid With No Options

October 24, 2008 By Louise Norris

[…] I realize that anecdotes are not statistical data. And the story of one family’s struggles with health insurance, regardless of how compelling that story may be, is indeed an anecdote. But I challenge anyone who believes that our health care and health insurance systems are not broken, to come up with a workable solution for the Wilkes family.

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform, Insurance Companies, United Healthcare

Individual Health Insurance Won’t Work For Everyone

June 6, 2008 By Louise Norris

We work primarily in the individual health insurance market. Colorado is one of the healthiest states in the US, and yet we still have about one applicant in ten unable to obtain coverage. Luckily we have a high risk pool – Cover Colorado – that we can present as a last resort, but the high premiums and out-of-pocket expenses can be a bit off-putting. Although 9 out of 10 applicants […]

Filed Under: Group Health, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Insurance Companies, Policy

Pre-Existing Conditions a Serious Issue For Health Insurance

April 30, 2008 By Louise Norris

…in Colorado, Cover Colorado provides a reasonable coverage option, although many people find that the only deductible they can afford is much higher than they would like. But what about people who live in the 40% of states that don’t have a high risk pool? Or the ones who live in states where the high risk pool was financially swamped ages ago and hasn’t […]

Filed Under: Group Health, Health Insurance Reform, Individual/Family Health, Policy

Colorado Blue Ribbon Commission Report Finalized

February 8, 2008 By Louise Norris

The Colorado Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform made its final report to the Colorado General Assembly last week. The 176 page document was endorsed by 24 of the 27 diverse commissioners, and includes provisions that the Commission says will reduce the number of Coloradans without health insurance (currently 792,000 people) by 88%. The… Read more about Colorado Blue Ribbon Commission Report Finalized

Filed Under: Health Insurance Reform

The Freedom of Individual Health Insurance

July 2, 2007 By Jay Norris

She said she realizes that the money they’ll be saving on their health insurance now is much greater than what she would have saved by having the group insurance through her employer for the 2 years she worked there. And the freedom it gave her and her husband is priceless.

Filed Under: Advice, COBRA, Individual/Family Health

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