CoverTN called 'insurance that doesn't insure'

[BlueJessamine]

Source: The Tennessean

Families USA, a national nonprofit advocate of changes to the health care system, called the state's basic health plan for working Tennesseans "bare bones" in a report released Thursday.

Advocates and the report criticized CoverTN's coverage and its limits.

"These are shallow benefits provided to people," said Ron Pollack, executive director of Washington, D.C.-based Families USA. "It's insurance that doesn't insure."

The state countered that the coverage serves its purpose: providing basic health care services.

snip

Gov. Phil Bredesen created CoverTN in 2006 after cutting 170,000 adults from TennCare, the state's expanded Medicaid program. The move was an attempt to control the cost of the program.


Read more: http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090522/NEWS07/905220359/1001/NEWS/CoverTN+called++insurance+that+doesn+t+insure+

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Cover Tennessee offers subsidized health care to low-income workers and insurance plans for children and people with chronic illnesses.


Thank you President Obama for appointing Kathleen Selibus to Health and Human Services Secretary -and NOT Phil Bredesen.

[izquierdista]

1. Insurance is for losers

Or more correctly, for people who don't want to be financial losers after some other predictable misfortune (hurricane, fire, theft, cancer) befalls them. The rich can afford to self-insure, but for the middle classes, even the highest levels of them, insurance becomes a necessity. They must pool their money so that the small percentage that need to claim against the fund will have the money there when they need it. Unfortunately, that pool of money attracts greedy Republican businessmen like flies to a corpse.

What started out as a socialist concept (from each according to his risk category, to each according to his loss) then becomes a capitalist playground, where the executives (Republicans) running the pool of money view it as theirs and claims are an annoying drain on profits. As long as the discussion about medical care is about insurance and not actual care, don't expect the situation to get any better, regardless of who is running the scam administering the program.

[Old Coot]

2. CoverTN is better than nothing (a little better).

Granted, it is very poor insurance. But, some coverage is better than none at all. Bredesen didn't have to provide any kind of insurance plan, at least he did something.

This all points to the great need in this country for some kind of comprehensive health care plan. It shouldn't be left up to the states.

Hopefully, congress will pass something that helps everyone to obtain good coverage.