Strickland wants limits on insurance premiums

COLUMBUS (AP) — Gov. Ted Strickland wants lawmakers to limit what health insurance companies can charge to people who buy individual policies, part of the governor’s plan to provide coverage for 110,000 uninsured Ohio adults.

The cap on premiums will be part of the governor’s proposed budget, which will be introduced in the General Assembly soon, Strickland spokeswoman Amanda Wurst said. The cap would be 11‚Ñ2 times the lowest rate charged to a person of similar age and gender, The Columbus Dispatch reported.

People with pre-existing conditions — such as brain tumors, cerebral palsy and emphysema — pay up to $1,000 a month in premiums for individual policies, an amount that doesn’t make sense to Strickland and patient advocates, the newspaper said.

The cap would reduce premiums by 50 percent to 70 percent and would provide coverage to 52,000 uninsured Ohioans. It would apply only to the individual health insurance market, not employer group plans.

The change would mean higher base rates for the 400,000 Ohio residents who buy individual policies, said Kelly McGivern, president of the Ohio Association of Health Plans.

“That means people will drop their coverage, and it’s more likely the young, healthy people will get out,” she said.

The impact of the cap would be a 5.5 percent increase on individual policies, said Doug Anderson, the Ohio Department of Insurance’s chief policy officer.

“This is less than 5 percent of the Ohio population that are potentially impacted by this in order to get coverage for 52,000 other people who don’t have any other options,” he said.

People with chronic conditions would still pay more on their premiums than healthy people, even with the cap. Other states have programs that affect individual policies, with many states mandating strong rate controls on all policies, Anderson said.

Strickland also would like to raise the age of those eligible for dependent coverage to 29 from 24, and he wants employers to let uninsured workers buy health insurance with pretax dollars, a move that could save 40 percent on premiums.

About 90 percent of the state’s 1.3 million uninsured are younger than 65.