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For Immediate Release: May 6, 2009
Contact: Adrienne Ammerman or Mary Robbins, 202-588-5180
Statement of Marcia D. Greenberger of NWLC:
Ending Gender Rating a Step Forward for Women in Health Care Reform
(Washington, DC) In an important step forward on Tuesday, Karen Ignagni, president of America’s Health Insurance Plans, conceded that women should not be charged more than men for health insurance.
The statement of Marcia D. Greenberger, Co-President of the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), follows:
“Fortunately, the insurance industry finally came around to the unfairness of charging women more for health insurance, and it’s about time. For too long, gender rating has caused hardship to many thousands of women, who have either had to forgo health insurance altogether, or sacrifice to cover the extra premium cost.
“There are other promising developments as well. Senator Kerry has introduced legislation that also takes steps to improve women’s access to health coverage in the individual market by preventing insurers from charging them more because of their sex.
“Senator Kerry cites a National Women’s Law Center report as the bill’s impetus. The report, released in September 2008, found that when women try to buy health insurance directly from insurance companies in the individual market, insurers can refuse to sell women coverage due to any health history, and often charge women drastically higher premiums than men. In addition, the coverage is frequently both exorbitant in cost and limited in scope – often failing to cover women’s specific needs, such as maternity care.
“In fact, our most recent research reveals that a majority of the best-selling insurance plans available through the leading online source for individual health insurance charge 30-year-old non-smoking women significantly more than even a male smoker of the same age, and many plans continue to charge non-smoking women more than male smokers at age 40. The vast majority of these plans do not include comprehensive maternity coverage.
“An especially egregious example can be found in Arkansas, where one of the best-selling individual plans—which does not provide any maternity coverage—charges a 40-year-old non-smoking woman 63 percent more each month than a 40-year-old male smoker.
“Both Senator Kerry’s bill and the insurance industry’s willingness to eliminate gender rating equal a step in the right direction for women in health care reform. But we still have a long way to go.
“Certainly, gender rating must be eliminated in both the individual market and in employer-based coverage. But health care reform must also eliminate the many other challenges that women face in getting access to quality, affordable, comprehensive health care. The cost of health care is among the top economic concerns of women and their families, and fixing our health care system is key to fixing our economy and providing peace of mind.
“Piece-meal measures will not be enough. Simply put: we can’t afford to wait any longer for meaningful reform that will bring a guarantee of quality, affordable comprehensive health care for us all.”
NWLC’s report: Nowhere to Turn: How the Individual Health Insurance Market Fails Women is available here: http://action.nwlc.org/insurance.
To learn more about NWLC’s work around women and health care reform, visit www.nwlc.org/reformmatters. To schedule an interview with Marcia Greenberger, contact Adrienne Ammerman at 202-588-5180 or aammerman@nwlc.org.
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