Friday, May 06, 2005
HSAs working to address the uninsured
[Ellen Beck, "Health Biz: HSAs make early headway," United Press International, The Washington Times, 5 May 2005.]
As Cover the Uninsured Week winds down, news that health savings accounts are emerging as a viable option for this population could lead to an important shift in how policymakers approach the problem:
It was a surprise for many this week, then, when America's Health Insurance Plans rolled out its latest statistics showing in the 14 months since their inception, HSAs have been opened by 1.03 million Americans -- and virtually all health plans belonging to AHIP now offer HSA options to individuals, as well as to small and large group employers.
"It's astonishing," remarked Greg Scandlen of the Galen Institute, a non-profit public policy group, in response to the AHIP numbers. "It's happening now, in the real world ... and Washington needs to pay attention to it."
AHIP's survey found 37 percent of the individual policies -- some 204,374 -- were sold to people who were previously uninsured; and 27 percent of the small group market plans, representing 37,868 covered lives, were bought by companies that had not previously offered a health insurance benefit to workers. So roughly 242,000 people went off the uninsured list because of HSAs.
[Matthew Hisrich, "HSAs are increasing Americans' health coverage," The Topeka Capital-Journal, 26 September 2004.]
[Ellen Beck, "Health Biz: HSAs make early headway," United Press International, The Washington Times, 5 May 2005.]
As Cover the Uninsured Week winds down, news that health savings accounts are emerging as a viable option for this population could lead to an important shift in how policymakers approach the problem:
It was a surprise for many this week, then, when America's Health Insurance Plans rolled out its latest statistics showing in the 14 months since their inception, HSAs have been opened by 1.03 million Americans -- and virtually all health plans belonging to AHIP now offer HSA options to individuals, as well as to small and large group employers.
"It's astonishing," remarked Greg Scandlen of the Galen Institute, a non-profit public policy group, in response to the AHIP numbers. "It's happening now, in the real world ... and Washington needs to pay attention to it."
AHIP's survey found 37 percent of the individual policies -- some 204,374 -- were sold to people who were previously uninsured; and 27 percent of the small group market plans, representing 37,868 covered lives, were bought by companies that had not previously offered a health insurance benefit to workers. So roughly 242,000 people went off the uninsured list because of HSAs.
[Matthew Hisrich, "HSAs are increasing Americans' health coverage," The Topeka Capital-Journal, 26 September 2004.]
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