"If you are wondering why the word COVID is never uttered in the press releases of musicians who are suffering from illness that makes them unable to perform...
It's because COVID-19 is an exclusion for most cancellation insurance because insurers know how huge of a risk it is."
#Insurance Executives Refused to Pay for the #Cancer Treatment That Could Have Saved Him.
This Is How They Did It.
A #Michigan law requires coverage of cancer drugs. One insurer came up with a “defensible” way to avoid paying for treatments that offered Forrest VanPatten his last chance for survival.
@ProPublica reporters will be tracking this hashtag and following up with information on how you can request the internal notes and audio surrounding the claim.
Doctors With Histories of Big #Malpractice Settlements Have Found a New Home in the #Insurance Industry
#Doctors working for health insurers can rule on 10,000 or more requests for care a year. At least a dozen were hired by major insurance companies after being disciplined by state medical boards or making multiple or outsized malpractice payments.
"Some rich countries have all public insurance, some use private coverage, but they have a few things in common: They insure pretty much everybody, their systems cost less money, and whether you have health care has nothing to do with whether you’re employed...In the United States, however, 57 percent of Americans under 65 get insurance through their jobs, and attempts to reform that system have all failed."
How Health Insurers Have Made Appealing Denials So Complicated
"I spoke with more than 50 insurance experts, patients, lawyers, physicians and consumer advocates about building a tool anyone could use to navigate insurance appeals.
"Nearly everyone said the same thing: Great idea. But almost impossible to do."
Health Plans Can’t Dodge Paying for Expensive New #Cancer Treatments, Says Michigan’s Top #Insurance Regulator
After ProPublica reported on a #health insurer that refused to cover the only medicine that could save a cancer patient’s life, #Michigan insurance regulators clarified that, by law, many plans must pay for any clinically proven treatments.
Cigna, a US health insurance provider, is being sued for the second time this year for using automated intelligence to deny medical care claims so they don't have to pay for them.
“Cigna’s algorithmic review process trades patient care for profit, allowing the provider to eliminate the cost of necessary review by doctors and qualified professionals and instead rely on impersonal, illegal review by an almost completely automated algorithm.”
What is Cigna's defense?
They claim that because the review takes place after patients have received treatment, it does not result in any denials of care.
No one said you denied care, Cigna. You denied PAYMENT FOR CARE.
Hey Cigna, maybe you need to be reminded that the service you sell is PAYING FOR CARE.
#Michigan Lawmaker to Introduce Bill Requiring State #Health Plans to Cover Cutting-Edge #Cancer Treatments
After ProPublica reported on a Michigan insurer that wouldn’t cover a cancer patient’s last-chance treatment, a state lawmaker said he would introduce a measure compelling health plans to cover a new generation of advanced cancer therapies.
"""
At least five large U.S. property insurers — including Allstate, American Family, Nationwide, Erie Insurance Group and Berkshire Hathaway — have told regulators that extreme weather patterns caused by climate change have led them to stop writing coverages in some regions, exclude protections from various weather events and raise monthly premiums and deductibles.
"""
As a clinician I feel like I rant too bitterly about health #insurance sometimes, but then I read what's been going on behind the scenes for decades and it is SO much worse. I was letting them off way too lightly. 😤
“Why are there such detailed records of slave ship #insurrections like those on board The Unity in 1770?
The reason why these revolts were documented was for #insurance purposes. So Lloyd’s of London or [another insurance company] would insure slave traders and their ships and their so-called cargo. One of the things they would insure them against was something called the insurrection of cargo—which is crazy if you think about it because how can cargo insurrect?”