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The Cost of Health Insurance and the Answer NO ONE Has

02.26.10

By Stuart Prescott

There are immediate and controllable things we can all do to impact our health care and health insurance system. Included are Consumerism, learning the best use of our medical insurance benefits, use of generic drugs, inquiring about and comparing price of services. Real tort reform, preventing defensive medicine, eliminating fraud and the overuse of imaging and lab facilities for extra profit would be huge contributors to reducing extraneous costs in our system. These steps can and should be done by each and every one of us.

But, I’ve heard NO ONE, and I mean NO ONE, ever give a solution to the primary and real cost of increasing health insurance premiums, the actual cost of care. Our government has totally missed the boat with the band aids that have been suggested (and nearly passing in Congress) so far.

Today I heard a fantastic report about a new procedure to locate and resolve a problem in an area of the brain that causes severe seizures. It’s a ground breaking procedure that totally transformed the life of the patient in the report. Previously, she suffered frequent and uncontrollable seizures which resulted in her inability to stay in a job, go to school and have appropriate social interaction. It is been over a year since her last seizure and today, she is employed, happy and apparently healthy.

The report praised the procedure but emphasized its great cost. The ‘cost’ in this instance, referred only to the immediate fees charged and didn’t even include the incredible cost of research and development . Perhaps, if given the opportunity, this procedure will eventually become more readily available and affordable but what about the costs now? Who should absorb the excessive costs? Insurance. Who does pay for this? Insurance. We reasonably expect these costs will reflect in the insurance premium we all pay. Do we stop advancement? Do we halt the scientific process? Should we stop the development of new drugs and technologies? Of course not!

So, unless we decide to stop progress, we’re stuck. I’ve heard NO ONE offer an answer to this problem. It’s a good and expensive problem to have. So, until we figure this one out…

posted by Rachel Meador on 02.26.10 • comments (0) • Employee Benefits