Richard Trumka: Big Health Insurance to Sick Kids: Suffer
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Big Health Insurance to Sick Kids: Suffer
Today at 3:01pm
It didn’t take long for Big Insurance to look for loopholes in the health care reform law. Just days after it was signed by President Obama, insurance companies are trying to weasel out of provisions designed to end the abuse and outrageous practices the insurance industry has inflicted on consumers and patients for years.
Sick kids are their first target.
Starting Sept. 23, the bill will ban insurance companies from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. But as The New York Times reports this morning, insurance lawyers are claiming the bill’s “fine print” allows them to refuse to cover children with pre-existing conditions such as asthma, diabetes, orthopedic problems, birth defects and other illnesses.
That claim is “outrageous,” says Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.).
The ink has not yet dried on the health care reform bill, and already some deplorable health insurance companies are trying to duck away from covering children with pre-existing conditions. This is outrageous.
The new law says insurance companies “may not impose any pre-existing condition exclusion” in their policies covering children under age 19. The insurance companies assert the law only requires coverage for pre-existing conditions ifa policy is sold and that it does not require access to a policy. In other words, insurance companies claim they can deny coverage for an entire family if one child is sick.Says Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.):
The concept that insurance companies would even seek to deny children coverage exemplifies why we fought for this reform.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)spokesman Nick Papas told Kaiser Health News:
The law is clear: Insurance plans that cover children cannot deny coverage to a child because he or she has a pre-existing condition. To ensure that there is no ambiguity on this point, the Secretary of HHS is preparing to issue regulations next month making it clear that the term “pre-existing exclusion” applies to both a child’s access to a plan and to his or her benefits once he or she is in the plan.
But you can bet the insurance company and their lawyers will fight every step of the way.
Click here to find out more about what the new health care reform law will do for you and your family.
Updated 5 hours ago · Comment ·Like Unlike · View Original Post · Report Note
2 people like this.
@ Richard... you approved this dirty healthcare deal when you could have stood up and fought for socialized healthcare.
4 hours ago ·
Alan read what the fight is about. Rich has done so and like many other people knows the heath care system is broken and this is the first step to fixing it. The system has many parts that don't work the way we want, so this imperfect bill is a start to put in place a method to improve health care so it will become what will help all the people.
2 hours ago · Report
No one said this bill was perfect or would be a fix all for 100 years of problems with health care. Passing this bill was and is a major victory in a long, hard, brutal war.
Are you really surprised the insurance companies want to protect their outrageous profits? I have always backed a single payer system but Americans are not ready for that.
However- do not become discouraged. Most importantly do not see this as a defeat and lose hope. We need to remember what a tremendous victory this is, keep fighting, and do not quit until we ensure that the True Intent of Health Care Reform is realized.
about an hour ago · Report
Organized labor backed a progressive bill to start the changes needed in the future for this country, There was a lot of opposition and most of it was orchestrated and funded from the profits of the insurance companies. It's a start- not a bad one either. More needs to be accomplished.
about an hour ago · Report
This was no victory; this was major defeat for the working class. We need socialized healthcare. I wouldn't vote for Obama or any of these Democrats promoting wars instead of healthcare. Socialized healthcare would create almost ten-million new jobs... pay for it by stopping these dirty wars. The AFL-CIO hasn't stood up for anything for working people--- you dumped all this money down a rat hole supporting Obama and got nothing in return.
about an hour ago ·
Sounds like you have got your work cut out for you in mobilizing the public support for socialized health care. What is your plan?
52 minutes ago · Report
Makes one wonder what people think can be done with the stroke of a pen and a wish.
48 minutes ago via Email Reply · Report
@ Jess: A lot can be taken away with the stroke of a pen--- but, it is through struggle that working people win.
@ Laura: We have been talking to people in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan about organizing around this very simple formula---
Peace = Socialized healthcare + Jobs
Jobs with the strict enforcement of affirmative action for people of color, women and the handicapped.
We, the Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council, are making this our outreach project.
Healthcare is real important to this country's more than two-million workers employed in the Indian Gaming Industry working in loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos getting poverty wages without any rights under state or federal labor laws.
After a few years working in these casinos most workers, if they are lucky enough to dodge cancers, develop some kind of heart or lung problems--- sometimes all three.
Of course, to keep your coalition partners (the Democratic Party) happy... the AFL-CIO is willing to overlook the problems of casino workers as the campaign contributions from these casino managements come flowing in.
I wouldn't expect you to understand... but, don't worry; you will understand soon enough as your hero Barack Obama and his Wall Street partners drive the standard of living of all workers down to the level of casino workers in the Indian Gaming Industry--- then we will all be in the same stinking, sinking boat.
First there was the bailout of the banks and financial insurance companies, then GM and Chrysler... now the health insurance industry is getting 30-million new customers compliments of the AFL-CIO and the Democratic Party... next will be a presidential pardon for Bernie Madoff one of Obama's biggest backers... maybe after Barack Obama's re-election in 2012 he will get around to the problems of working people--- oh, ya, before he does that he has to finish giving the rest of the country away to Wall Street under the guise of his "green economy/green jobs" which you will hail no matter how rotten the deal is as a great victory just like this health insurance bailout scam that is unconstitutional to begin with--- but, who cares about a little thing like legislation being unconstitutional if it might save Barack Obama's worthless political butt.
You know, this "green economy/green jobs" thing really has me puzzled. Why is Barack Obama, whose big campaign contributors, the Crown family, not talked to the Crowns about keeping those refrigerator jobs in this country instead of shipping the jobs to Mexico? Wasn't this a perfect example of green manufacturing producing a green product in a smoke-free workplace unlike what casino workers have to suffer? Isn't it time to begin talking about public ownership of plants and nationalization of industries to save American jobs?
The "reds" fought to organize the unions to protect the rights and livelihoods of working people and now a bunch of wimpy union "leaders" are refusing to defend these very jobs.
Really; I don't get it... why isn't the big, powerful AFL-CIO standing up for workers' rights, livelihoods and health?
Workers in Canada who are members of unions affiliated with the Canadian Labour Congress, go to the polls voting for their socialist party--- the New Democratic Party... it seems like their is a message here for American workers and the AFL-CIO: Wake-up! Stop voting for the bosses' party.
Well, Laura; we do have a plan and our work is cut out for us--- it might be a little easier if all the over-paid, big-mouth labor leaders like Richard Trumka put a little fight behind their militant sounding rhetoric and actually put some resources behind the idle-rhetoric coming from people like Stewart Acuff who claimed he was going to be bringing "warriors for justice" into these battles.
Where are these "warriors for justice?"
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