Insurance Industry - Our best interests at heart?

Monday, Oct 19,2009, 2:35:17 PM Click:

The insurance industry is spending millions to impede real health care reform. Why? Because blocking health care reform is in THEIR best interest, not ours.

Historically, insurance companies have played a lot of games to grow their bottom line - at our expense. Before the HIPPA laws were put in place in the 1990s, insurance companies could have pre-existing exclusions for more than a year. And if you changed insurance companies? A NEW pre-existing waiting period. This practice was only stopped by government intervention - HIPPA. (Thank you, Teddy Kennedy!)

In the past, HMOs introduced a so-called a "gag" clause in their contracts with doctors. It meant that doctors were prohibited even from discussing a treatment option with you if it wasn't covered by your HMO. You wouldn't even know that treatment was a possibility for you. An insurance bureaucrat between you and your doctor.

Dr. Linda Pino testified in Congress that the bonuses she and her colleagues got as medical directors for the insurance company (pre-certification) were often based on the number of procedures denied to patients. More procedures denied, more money for the medical reviewer.

The top 10 insurance company CEOs get an average of 11 million a year - that's 30,000 every day of the year - at the expense of those who are insured and denied coverage and those who are considered "uninsurable" by the insurance companies.

Premiums have gone up at least 131% over the past 10 years. Many small businesses have had to drop their coverage for employees - particularly if one of those employees has actually had significant medical expenses.

So why are Americans listening to the ads written and paid for by the INSURANCE industry. Since when have they been on our side?