Lesson 6: Health Insurance
This lesson discusses the difficulties surrounding the individual who wishes to purchase individual health insurance. It reviews the different kinds of health insurance available. It attempts to clarify the confusing terminology, and define some of the welter of acronyms, found in health insurance. Lastly, it identifies some of the things to look for, and look out for, in health insurance policies.
Group Health Insurance
Due to many causes the effort to secure personal health insurance has become a minefield for consumers. We should note at the outset that if you have Group Health Insurance available to you as part of the benefits package where you work, you should go for it and stay with it. It is likely to be chepar than comparable health insurance you could buy personally. There is also an advantage in numbers. The Health Insurance Portability Act of 1996 requires companies to accept all members of a group regardless of health. That raises one final point. Just because you may be a young person and presently in good health, you are not immune from accidents or from contracting debilitating or deadly diseases. Present good health is not a reason to pass on health insurance. Bear in mind that should you once acquire a "preexisting conditon", that malady will always be excluded from coverage, or cause significant extra cost, on any subsequent individual health insurance policy you may buy.
