Copyright 1999 The Hartford Courant Company
THE
HARTFORD COURANT
March 19, 1999 Friday, STATEWIDE
SECTION: MAIN; Pg. A19
LENGTH: 432 words
HEADLINE:
COST OF 'PARITY' INSURANCE PROPOSAL AT ISSUE;
MENTAL, ADDICTION COVERAGE
ADVOCATED
BYLINE: DIANE LEVICK; Courant Staff Writer
BODY:
Premiums would rise slightly but society
would save much more money in the long run if insurers were required to cover
mental and addiction problems on the same terms as other diseases, advocates
told legislators Thursday.
By providing more treatment, the "parity"
bill would lower crime, highway deaths, loss of work time and productivity, and
the use of other health services, speakers said at a public hearing of the
legislature's insurance and real estate committee. "The benefits to society
outweigh the costs," said Jelani Lawson, executive director of the Connecticut
Drug Policy Leadership Council.
The bill before the insurance committee
would not include substance abuse, so many speakers urged an amendment to
provide parity in coverage for addictions.
Lisa Martin of Hartford
credited a six-month alcoholism treatment program for helping to keep her sober
for eight years -- something her current insurance policy, with its 45-day
limit, would not have covered.
"It saved my life," Martin said of the
program. "Parity [in insurance] will save others."
Only 10 biologically
based mental illnesses such as schizophrenia and major depression now must be
covered as generously as heart disease, diabetes, or other illnesses in
Connecticut.
But for other mental health and any substance abuse
problems, patients typically have higher co-payments and annual caps -- such as
a $2,000 maximum on outpatient visits for treatment.
"We have learned so
much" about such illnesses, "and yet our insurance laws do not reflect this,"
said Betsy Henley-Cohn. She and her husband, U.S. Rep. Sam Gejdenson, have a
child with obsessive-compulsive disorder, which is subject to insurance parity
now, and Tourette's syndrome, which is not.
The bill, though, drew
opposition from the Association of Connecticut HMOs and the Connecticut Business
and Industry Association.
The measure would raise premiums 3 percent to
5 percent, which would translate to an additional $150 to $200 a year per
employee for a business, said Jan Spegele, representing CBIA. She warned that
the higher premiums would result in increasing numbers of uninsured people as
small employers or their workers become unable to afford coverage.
The
bill's advocates, however, cited a Coopers & Lybrand study showing that full
insurance parity for mental health and
addictions added only $1.01 per member per month to insurance premiums in North
Carolina and $1.12 in Vermont.
The bill, like any state insurance
mandates, would not apply to self- insured health plans, which many large
employers have.
LOAD-DATE: March 19, 1999
