It has been all over the news today that insurance companies are sending letters canceling insurance for people in the individual market. The Republicans and the right wing media are trying to spin this as a bad thing.
It isn't. And we need to make sure that the American people are aware of this.
You see the Affordable Care Act established certain minimum standards for insurance policies, and those plans that don't meet these minimum standards are being canceled. Jay Carney explained this in his briefing today:
So what is certainly the case is that come January 1st, 2014, plans that don’t provide these basic benefits, plans that don’t provide maternity care, plans that don’t provide mental health care, plans that don’t provide other preventive services, plans that place caps on your annual benefits or caps on your lifetime benefits -- all of those can no longer exist, because the purpose here was to create some minimum benefits for the American people so that they could enjoy the security of health insurance coverage, quality health insurance coverage.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/....
So as a result of the Affordable Care Act, all of these people who have been covered by these substandard plans will now have the opportunity to be covered by better ones.
Up until now people buying insurance in the individual market have been at the mercy of insurance companies. As Carney said today:
And that market has been like the Wild West. It has been under regulated. It is the place where Americans have most keenly felt the challenges posed by the insurance system in this country, where, for example, insurers could deny you coverage if you have a preexisting condition, or they could offer you coverage that in its fine print excluded benefits specifically related to your preexisting condition. So if you have hypertension or you’re a cancer survivor, they could carve out coverage on those specific issues and then give you a plan that would cover you on other things.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/....
One of the realities of the "wild west insurance market" is that the people who have these individual policies are less likely to have significant health problems. And that is because people with pre-existing conditions up to now could be denied insurance coverage in the individual market.
And I would bet that many of these healthier people have never read the fine print in their insurance policies. Because if they did, or if they had a major illness and found out exactly what is not covered by their insurance policy, I would bet that they would no longer want to keep their existing insurance if they had a choice.
What we are dealing with here is the result of years of Republican spin against the Affordable Care Act. Death panels. A government bureaucrat making health care decisions for you. And this spin has resulted in fear--fear of the unknown. Fear that the insurance they will receive under the Affordable Care Act is worse than what they have now, not better.
So every time you get in a conversation with someone complaining about these cancelations, I'd suggest that you tell them to go home and read the fine print in their insurance policy and see exactly what their insurance will not cover. And then tell them that the major part of "Obamacare" is setting certain minimum standards for private insurance, much like the government sets minimum safety standards for cars and food.