Report Illustrates Potential Difficulties People With Serious Illnesses Face in Maintaining Affordable Health Coverage, Paying for Health Care
People with cancer and other serious illnesses can face difficulties affording health care coverage and treatment even when they have private health insurance, according to a report jointly released on Thursday by the American Cancer Society and the Kaiser Family Foundation, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The report profiles 20 cancer patients whose experiences are representative of the types of problems reported to ACS' Health Insurance and Financial Assistance for the Cancer Patient office. The 20 patients include nine with employer-sponsored coverage, one with coverage through COBRA, seven with individual health plans, two with coverage through a state-sponsored high-risk pool and one who became uninsured (Colliver, San Francisco Chronicle, 2/6).
The report highlights five key gaps in the health care system that can leave people with serious illnesses in financial jeopardy because of their diagnoses:
- High copayments and exhaustion of benefits as a result of annual and lifetime coverage caps imposed by insurers;
- Unaffordable coverage through COBRA, which allows a patient to remain enrolled in an employer-sponsored health plan after leaving the company by paying 102% of the cost of coverage;
- High costs of individual health plans, which also can exclude applicants based on pre-existing conditions;
- Long waits and delays in becoming eligible or applying for Medicaid and Medicare coverage; and
- State high-risk pools that are offered only in 35 states, and can be costly (Anstett, Detroit Free Press, 2/6).
Kaiser Family Foundation President and CEO Drew Altman said, "You would at least think the health care system would work for the people who are sick," adding, "What this study shows is there are lots of gaps and holes and problems for the people who are the sickest in our society. That's the opposite of how health care should work" (San Francisco Chronicle, 2/6).
CBS' Evening News on Thursday included a segment on the report that includes comments from Altman, ACS President John Seffrin and two cancer patients (LaPook, "Evening News," CBS, 2/5).
The report is available online.
The Kaiser Family Foundation and ACS in conjunction with the report released a video documentary examining the financial consequences faced by three privately insured people who were diagnosed with cancer. The video is available online.
A webcast of a media briefing to release the report and video also is available online at kaisernetwork.org. The webcast features comments from Altman; Seffrin; John Rowe of the Department of Health Policy Management at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health; Karen Pollitz, project director of the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute; Karen Schwartz, a senior policy analyst with the Kaiser Family Foundation; and Kristi Martin, associate policy analyst with ACS. This is part of the Morning Briefing, a summary of health policy coverage from major news organizations. Sign up for an email subscription.
