http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2014/02/senior_citizens_forced_into_pediatric_plansSenior citizens forced into pediatric plans
HEADACHE: Barbara Anderson holds a letter from her insurance company in her Marblehead home office for Citizens for Limited Taxation yesterday. Anderson, who will discuss Obamacare on Boston Herald Radio’s ‘Trending Now’ at noon today, says she is being forced into a more costly health plan that covers pediatrics.
Monday, February 10, 2014
One of the state’s leading advocates of small government claims she’s the latest victim of a big government nightmare — Obamacare — saying it is forcing her to switch her workers to a more costly health plan that covers pediatric dental care — even though all the employees are senior citizens.
“I’m 70, the other two are in their 60s,” said Barbara Anderson, president of Citizens for Limited Taxation. “We do not have family plans. There are no pediatrics involved. There is no reason we should have to offer a pediatric dental plan.”
Anderson said her insurer, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, notified her last week — less than two months before her company’s policy was to be renewed — that it would expand plans to include 10 “essential health benefits,” as required by law. The change may apply to only one of the three people who work at Citizens for Limited Taxation because the other two have Medicare plans, but Anderson is still waiting for details.
Harvard Pilgrim couldn’t be reached for comment last night.
“I clearly remember the president and my congressman telling me that I could keep the plan if I liked it,” said Anderson, an Obamacare opponent who will be on Boston Herald Radio at noon today.
Last year, millions of people who buy insurance individually were told their plans would be canceled because they didn’t meet Obamacare requirements — even though President Obama had promised people could keep their plans if they liked them. After a national outcry Obama apologized and allowed insurance companies to keep the plans temporarily.
Chris Geehern, spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, said the employer group hasn’t heard complaints like Anderson’s from other businesses yet.
“Most of the issues that we’ve been dealing with is there are changes in the way insurance companies rate and price policies that are in some cases raising small employer rates as much as 50 percent,” he said.
