Exchange Plans Hide Your True Financial Exposure

This entry is from Dr. McCanne's Quote of the Day, a daily health policy update on the single-payer health care reform movement. The QotD is archived on PNHP's website.

Coverage When It Counts

How much protection does health insurance offer and how can consumers know?

By Karen Pollitz, Eliza Bangit, Jennifer Libster, Stephanie Lewis, and Nicole Johnston
Center for American Progress Action Fund, May 2009

Knowing whether insurance provides adequate coverage can be a challenge. Health insurance policies are complex products, highly variable in their design, and key information about how coverage works is not always disclosed during marketing. Further, health insurance promises protection against future, unknown events. Consumers who are healthy today can find it difficult to anticipate future medical problems and costs and harder still to evaluate how insurance might cover those needs.