Comment by OminousWeapons | Hacker News Reader

Comment by OminousWeapons | Hacker News Reader

I was working on a health insurance related startup for awhile so I would say I know more than the average person about the space, and even I get surprised on a regular basis by the absurdity in this field.

For example, I was finishing up an advanced degree program between September and January and my University decided to terminate my health insurance in September. Without telling me. In the middle of a pandemic. When I discovered this last week, I attempted to buy health insurance directly from insurers and was informed that I could not get coverage until January 1st of 2021 as I was "outside the eligibility window". They literally won't sell active coverage to me at any price. Apparently you only have two months after losing your insurance to be able to buy new insurance before having to wait until specific times in the year. I can buy home insurance, liability insurance, car insurance, and any other type of insurance whenever I want but god forbid I try to buy health insurance 61 days after an arbitrary point in the year. I effectively cannot go outside until January 1st as if I get covid and have to go to the hospital I'm screwed.

The intent here is to prevent people from gaming the system by buying insurance only right after a serious diagnosis.

There are several qualifying events to be able to enroll outside the eligibility window if you’ve had a job change for example.

>The intent here is to prevent people from gaming the system by buying insurance only right after a serious diagnosis.

Of course.. but, that's basically why health insurance should be "required" for everyone, because then it's not an issue.

Because if you are not gaming the system, and make a simple mistake by OP, it can be fucking life altering.

I was in a similar situation a few years ago. For whatever reason our auto payment stopped on the health insurance on a year-to-year rollover. I didn't notice, everything is on autopay. Sure it was my 'fault', but you know what the result was? I was uninsured for 9 months (except for a garbage plan I could find that I'm sure would have done almost nothing).. if something serious had happened I would have been FUCKED.

So yeah we can sit here and say all this bullshit about eligibility windows. But the truth of the matter is every one of these things just points to why the entire country should be covered.

It's honestly SICK how some people think healthcare should work. And honestly the amount of resources put into all the billing jobs and compliance and all the bullshit is STAGGERING. How much energy is wasted on the bullshit billing systems and rules which are just made to fuck people over who have health problems.

/rant off

Just as a heads up in case you or anyone else reading this is in this position. For the uninsured, if your treatment is directly related to Covid-19, you would be covered under the Covid-19 HRSA program described here. https://www.hrsa.gov/CovidUninsuredClaim

This is a huge relief; thank you for bringing this to my attention!

You can buy short term insurance. It is outside of the healthcare market place and typically does no cover pre-existing conditions (you have to qualify for it). I actually switched to it 100% as the premiums are way cheaper and I just want insurance against million dollar fees on the low chance I get cancer or I'm in an accident.

Would you mind linking to where you did this?

https://nationalgeneral.com/ -- then you want some form of "short term" health insurance.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com