Access To Quality Care Act: More Mandates, More Uninsured

Jan 07, 1999

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 7, 1999

CONTACT: Richard Coorsh

(202) 824-1787
mailto:%20rcoorsh@hiaa.org

The following statement was released today by Chip Kahn, President of the Health Insurance Association of America (HIAA):

Mandates, no matter how well intended, raise the cost of health insurance. Even a so-called modest increase in insurance premiums leads to hundreds of thousands of people losing health coverage. Accordingly, consumers seeking affordable health coverage, and consumers afraid of losing their coverage, should look at Dr. Norwood's "Access to Quality Care Act" with wary apprehension.

Health insurers support most of the protections backed by President Clinton's health care quality commission. We also believe that the commission got it right when it chose not to call for new federal laws and regulations and avoided recommending provisions that would raise consumers' premiums by exposing health plans to expensive litigation. Furthermore, most private health plans already feature many consumer protections. In fact, a General Accounting Office report released last year favorably rated health plans for the grievance and appeals procedures that already are in place.

Behind its veneer, so-called "patient protection" legislation, as proposed by Dr. Norwood, is little more than poorly disguised provider protection that would guarantee a financial windfall for doctors and trial lawyers at the expense of average consumers, and add hundreds of thousands of Americans to the rolls of the uninsured. Congress should instead seek ways to provide affordable, private coverage to the 43.5 million Americans who currently lack it.