Jim McDermott: Trumps health-care plan has already been tried
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However, the fate of health-care reform took a sharp turn after Republicans won control of the state legislature in 1994.
They quickly unraveled the law by scrapping key provisions, including the individual mandate. But they kept in place many of the consumer protections, including the requirement that insurers sell policies to people with preexisting conditions.
It quickly became clear that this was unsustainable. Without an incentive to maintain coverage at all times, people could simply wait until they needed care to enroll in a policy.
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This was not an unusual case. Insurers faced catastrophic losses as individuals enrolled in coverage only when they needed it. This wreaked havoc on the individual insurance market, causing dramatic premium spikes and an industry death spiral. By 1999 there were virtually no individual policies offered in the state.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-health-care-plan-has-already-been-tried-it-was-a-disaster/2017/01/05/161afdd4-d364-11e6-9cb0-54ab630851e8_story.html?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.6c0803e8ba3e
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