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NEW YORK BILL FIRST STEP IN BATTLE AGAINST PRE-EXISTING CONDITION DISQUALIFICATIONS
As the national battle over health care rages in Washington, the rights of patients to receive health insurance regardless of pre-existing conditions is slowly coming to the forefront of the debate.
That’s thanks in large part to one man, 37-year-old Ian Pearl of Florida.
CNN profiled Pearl, who suffers from muscular dystrophy, after he learned that the Guardian insurance company was dropping his coverage because it was too expensive. Pearl said losing his health care coverage would have been a death sentence.
In a Guardian company e-mail, one employee referred to those in Pearl’s high-cost class of policies like as “the few dogs” because their policies each cost more than $1 million per year. Guardian used a legal loophole to drop the entire line of policies, including Pearl.
Shortly after Pearl’s story ran, Guardian restored his policy.
But, more importantly, the New York State Senate introduced “Ian’s Law” — a bill that would close the loophole and make it illegal to terminate an an insurance policy line as a pretext to dropping coverage for individuals who need it most.
“My great hope is that Ian’s Law will end up protecting more people than I will ever know, who will never have to go through any sort of battle again because of this bill,” an elated Pearl said upon hearing of the bill’s introduction.
My great hope, as someone with a disease very similar to — but fortunately much milder to — Pearl, is that we can irradiate the practice of disqualifying or terminating individuals based on pre-existing health conditions.
Listen up lawmakers: Ian’s Law should be everywhere.
I saw this story today on CNN. Sure, it’s a feel good story. But you really need to give more attention to why it takes $1M/year to keep this guy healthy. And, whey should the people that pay their health insurance premiums to Guardian need to subsidize this guy’s $1M/year lifestyle? He seems like a nice guy, but is he really worth $2740/day? Sorry, but I’m just keeping real.
Cancellation of policies like this insures death and suffering for innocent people whose only crime is being sick. Surely there must be laws against his kind of crime against humanity. This could not happen in most European countries, Canada, Japan or Taiwan where everybody is covered and nobody can be dropped at the whim of some greedy insurance executive.
What can we do, as a Father and Mother of an MS sufferer,to get legislature of this sort in Washington?
Jim Hanna
I take issue with the guy who asked the questions if the guy is worth 2740, I would say that people have no price. Everyone should have access to healthcare, it should not just be a benefit but a right, and more so being born in US, one of the wealthiest countries in the world. It is sad that if you are going to the ER the first think that they will check is your credit report and not your pulse. I have lived in many countries of the world and this a preposition that America needs to get right. He is a person and he doesn’t has a price tag he is a priceless, I know that it is a cultural concept, it is a belief, is a paradigm that takes a heart change in order to grasp.
[...] Palmetto Scoop | Ian’s Law [F...Me] [...]
This case really points to the unsustainability of a health care system that will treat anyone for anything as if money grows out of a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. Ian Pearl had a choice, he could have gone to a facility for treatment at a much more manageable cost or gotten around the clock in-home health care that is a fiscal drag on the rest of the system. He chose the latter, in my mind selfishly. Medical care that costs $1 million a year for 1 person is a train wreck waiting to happen. If 1 in 1000 people become Ian Pearl’s the 999 others would need to pay $1,000 a year more in premiums just to cover the one person’s ailments. Imagine if a decade from now we have some treatment that can improve the life of an autism patient but the drug and therapy or whatever they may come up with costs $200,000 a year. With 1 in 100 people being autistic, that would be an extra $2,000 in premiums those other 99 people would pay. The more we innovate and create better healthcare outcomes for more people for more money, the closer we get to imploding the system. What we will inevitably head towards is a multi-tiered healthcare system based on the ability to pay, however unethical you think that may be.
How about me? Blue Cross cancelled my plan and just because I am in a group of older people. Is age 57 too old?
I paid 30 years for others to get great health care and now that I older I don’t get mine.
It is more about Mr. Klingsworth CEO getting 3.5 million dollars in salary this year when profits have fallen 46%.
Get real and don’t take it out on Ian, poor fellow. You should be ashamed of yourself, death courts are next. I’ll be on yours!