“Low cost private insurance plans are now available throughout the U.S.”
Medicaid recipients fall into two main groups: poor families with children, and chronically sick and poor individuals. Neither of these groups can qualify for low-cost private insurance.
Which brings us to…
“For high-risk patients with chronic medical conditions, a risk pool like California’s “Managed Risk Medical Insurance Board” would be used to obtain more affordable policies than would otherwise be available”
Well, technically, if a poor person with a chronic disease would currently pay $10,000 a year for medical coverage (if it were available), and would only have to pay $8,000 under the plan, that is indeed “more affordable.” But how about a few more specifics here? “More affordable” to whom?
For the past few years, health-insurance companies have been stampeding out of the individual-coverage market; what on earth makes you suppose they’d be eager to rush back into it, given the very real possibility their profits would be even more negligible than before?
