And critics of higher rates for smokers say the practice can make health insurance unaffordable for many, especially those with lower incomes. Loss prevention, however, reserves care for those who need it. If you start down that road, there's no stopping. This practice may lead many people to forego health insurance even though they may have to pay a fine under the ACA. Why should we pay pay for others' poor choices? Why should those who have healthy habits subsidise them? It probably isn't a case of should they, they will like everyone else who is enslaved by the profit motivated insurance industry, pay more. And again if the Doctor says you need help in achieving your goal in health. 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We, AOL, are part of the Yahoo family of brands. Come on, being fat and being a smoker are BOTH addictions and choices, just like a drug addict. Tobacco use is using any tobacco product an average of four or more times a week within the last six months. A study of 20,000 employees showed that smokers had more hospital visits per 1,000 (124 versus 76), had a longer average length of stay (6.5 versus 5 days) and made six more visits to health care facilities per year than non-smokers. Rewarding criminals and people who have no will to be responsible for their lives is what is destroying our Country! Yes, I think they should be part of any risk pool their state has. As long as there are no consequences for these people for their choices why would they change. How Long Should Myeloma Patients Continue Lenalidomide After AutoSCT. You will be notified in advance of any changes in rate or terms. Healthy, beautiful people have all the advantages in life. Yes, Jack. And we'd love to know where you're writing from, so please include your city and state with your comment. They've introduced weight loss programs or classes to help people stop smoking. Luis Rosales. Read Grateful Patient Fundraising: Ethically Problematic or Altruistic? Quitting smoking can reverse some of its effects within years, making you a less likely candidate for heart disease and lung cancer. Do we want someone not going to the doctor for fear of their rates going up? When you quit smoking, you can effectively reverse some of its effects on your health. Fat, smokers, too skinny, birth defects, pimples. everyone should pay more, right? There are health issue associated with those folks as well. came here to say this, and I agree. We really need a complete national group single payer medical coverage for all. Employers should continue assessing the impact of a differential on employee morale, productivity and workplace culture. There should also be discounts for people who live an active life style, and take care of themselves in comparison to their age group! Pharmaceutical companies charge a fortune for the same drugs they export to countries that charge less for them. Taking up smoking cessation programs by insurers lowers health insurance premiums for smokers. for charging me more for healthcare. First, the surcharge makes insurance more expensive, meaning it is harder for people to afford. Prohibition proved that. Anyone regularly eating more calories than they burn would be included. How will the fiscal cliff affect the way you handle your money. smokers get the ass end of every stick, even though people do way stupider things that risk their lives. A better, but less dramatic solution is to continue an all-out assault on both alcohol abuse and production of food with too much sugar through education, public service, health providers and organizations. Futhermore, how can anyone say this would hurt poor folks when ciggarettes are $6 per pack, just 1 pack a day is $180 a month they could use for better food or a gym membership. These people should be paying more money for health insurance. For your bank account? Around 70% of people who have a college degree (or a higher degree), also said they were in support of charging smokers more for health insurance. If youre coming to Australia on a temporary 600 visa, Overseas Visitor Health Cover (OVHC) is health insurance that cov From dentists to optometrists, its nice to build a relationship and enjoy that personal touch. No need to play big brother by charging people more for health insurance. Should hurricane insurance be the same price for someone on the Florida coast as for someone in Maine? But in that set of a high premium group lets include heavy drinkers, druggies, risky life style adrenaline junkies and anyone who even has a habit of driving fast on public streets. $ + tax People who use more healthcare resources because of a poor lifestyle choice such as smoking or poor diet should pay more. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads. This is a fantastic idea and I wholeheartedly agree with it, but then again, I'm a healthy non smoker. and people might get healthier. I excersize daily and I have a positive outlook on life. I don't like the idea of making anyone pay more (people pay enough as it is), I think discounts for good behavior would be appropriate. In addition, some states have laws protecting employees who engage in legal off-duty conduct such as smoking. We deserve the same coverage that our hired help takes for granted. We should not discourage smokers from getting insurance. My ex-doctor had 9 signs on the wall of his waiting room stating cash for service rendered and no Medicare accepted. Then we get into a whole debate over which stupid behavior deserves discounted healthcare and which doesn't. However, I don't think there should be a set fee. Image via iStock, long list of serious and often life-threatening health impacts. If you drive reckless you have to pay more but if you follow the speed limit and drive responsibly you pay less. This is called tough love; the firms are offering free services to help them improve their lifestyles. Of course, this is America, corporations are free to do anything they want and individuals pay all the freight. They should only be charged more if 1) their habits actually incur measurably more cost, and 2) those individuals without the same habits get a discount. If they participate and make improvements then there is no impact. Smokers, however, should definitely pay more for health care, etc. Smoking-related illnesses cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars a year in health care expenditures and lost productivity, and claim hundreds of thousands of lives. Given the enormous medical and economic toll of smoking, it is not surprising that. VOTE THE BUMS OUT. After all, like the commercial states, who doesn't want 50% more cash! Jack, The main problem with the actuarial fairness argument is that different smokers may have different risks. How many that do smoke get a physical on a yearl basis? No one should be able to tell an adult that she cant spend her hard-earned money on cigarettes. The tobacco industry needs 5,000 new smokers every day to stay afloat. In addition, the ACA tries to make insurance affordable for more people by subsidizing the price of their insurance. That one's a bit harder because while being overweight, such as gross obesity, is a health issue, being overweight is relative and doesn't have as close a correlative relationship to health as smoking does. If we are to receive adequate healthcare in this very backward country, we must rein the medical industry in tightly. Or. Only if drunks & drug addicts will pay more. upheld hand. When you apply for health insurance, you are required to report whether or not you are a smoker. Moreover, if smokers are charged higher rates, then other higher-risk groups should also be charged higher rates, since it would be unfair to single out smokers. Sure. If they can pay for their smoking, there is no way they can not pay for their additional cost of their own health care, if they can kill them selves with money why to be burden other people who lives healthy life style. For those of us who must struggle in our writing to convey with clarity the complicated ideas we are driven to share, Wills gift for off-the-cuff eloquence was awe-inspiring. Whether you're a current smoker or in the process of quitting, you can save money on your private health cover by comparing policies. Thus, when smokers are faced with a steep surcharge, some of themespecially younger ones who dont yet suffer from the long-term consequences of smokingsimply decide to forgo insurance. Yes, they should pay more. The price of car insurance is based on driving record. Just as your auto loan down payment and interest rate are computed by your credit, income, stability, etc which creates the exposure to the risk of loan default. Well you ask for my opinion!!". Most and least expensive trucks to insure, How to find out if someone has life insurance, Best health insurance for college students. Everyone keeps complaining about the health care, but don't take efforts to eat correctly and they know they should! Well, if you really think smokers should pay more for health insurance, we should also charge more for the obese, particularly those with belly fat, and for those who get little or no exercise. Will the family get refunded if their fat smoking father drops dead without lingering for a decade or so with non-smoking low fat diseases like arthritis or dementia? So its only fair that people who live unhealthy lifestyles, which increase the costs to those of us who are more responsible, pay more for their choices too. Let's take smokers. I think educating them is. People who work in office jobs and sit all day since that's terrible for you? Health insurers in Germany have conducted studies which have shown that smokers die younger than non-smokers. 2 out of 3 Australians thinks so. How were we duped and what can we do about the opioid overdose crisis? Jack, when we start down this road of charging people higher premiums based on the choices they make where does it end. Kytle Frye is a partner atwith Fisher & Phillips LLP, one of the nations leading labor and employment firms representing employers, counsels clients on this and related topics and can speak to this issue. You'll be able to breathe better. However, if rates are too low they may not provide a sufficient financial incentive to stop smoking. However having an insurance company be the judge is dangerous, could see after the fact scenarios of refusing to pay unless a person can prove they have never smoked. ET to see if Jack reads your answer on the air. However, before employers can levy the surcharge they must give smokers an opportunity to qualify for nonsmoker rates by offering a way for them to quit. Insurance companies argue that its only fair to charge tobacco users more. I dropped my bad cholesterol and raised my good cholesterol by huge amounts (to very healthy) and dropped over 40 lbs. We do not charge a person more that jay walks and gets hit by a car and we do not charge the Gal that has a child every year more because she gives birth like a rabbit. He has a brain tumor. Absolutely! So smokers seem to be an excellent target to help employers manage costs. Private health insurance wasn't created so everyone could get healthy it is a financial product in the United States. The benchmark for all insurance underwriting is computed by an exposure to risk formula. Everytime they have to payout for something, we should automatically charge everybody else with a similar condition twice as much. His trial work has involved virtually all areas of labor and employment practice, including employment discrimination, harassment, wage and hour, wrongful discharge, FMLA, public accommodation under the ADA and labor litigation. Its all about personal responsibility..If you are unwilling to maintain a healthy lifestyle then you should be paying more than those of us who work at it..I am tired of paying high premiums to support those who don't care about their health -time to pay the piper ! You may cancel your subscription at anytime by calling It is an interesting thought about how that would implicate unhealthy people. Both are just as costly in care as smoking/weight. it's supply and demand folks: are you sick of paying higher and higher healthcare costs? A massive wave of Covid infections has begun now that China has ended much of its zero Covid policy. 2023 Compare Club, All Rights Reserved. If you have a poor driving record, drive a sports car, or live in a high-theft area, you're going to pay more for your car insurance than [] The cost of health cover has been steadily rising over the last several years, and Australians are getting frustrated. Image via iStock, Improved life expectancy. Another tax on the poor and middle class in terms of a health insurance "surtax" will not fix the problem. The services have been available but no one took advantage. There is always a reason but there is never an excuse for bad health. The Insurance company shouldn't give you a hard time in achieving that goal either. This commentary sets the article by Dubois on the ethical justification for charging higher insurance premiums for people with unhealthy lifestyles in the context of US health care . If people can't be motivated to change their bad habits on their own, maybe higher health care costs will make them think twice about their choices. Already a member? That doesn't make any sense. Some view them as equivalents of nicotine chewing gum or nicotine skin patches, and others see the product as another form of tobacco use, as life insurers do. Just look at the people riding the motorized shopping carts. Raise taxes on cigarettes and have that money go towards healthcare. Most insurance plans cover smoking-cessation programs. Maybe we can answer this by expanding your question: what if a person is an alcoholic? In a society where brand marketing has glorified unhealthy habits including smoking, video games and fast food over the years, it seems as a society we are struggling to correct these mistakes. Smoking clearly impacts health care costs and may legitimately affect premium rates, but are there pitfalls and dangers in imposing premium differentials? What about those who use to be silm and later became FAT? How does primary and secondary insurance work? Really do you really think the insurance companies will stop charging more and chose one of us over the other? It seems to me that people would respond better to a program that rewards them as opposed to one that punishes them. Many studies have shown that smokers cost the health care system more and that they cost health insurers more. I have always thought it odd that smokers are so shunned, at least in part because of the health problems and costs they bring, while the wilfully overweight are victims of the fast food industry. Open a newChase Private ClientChecking account and get a $2000 bonus! Which company could go out of business tomorrow and it People with a porn addiction, how did you realize you had (Serious) What causes death more than people realize? Tobacco is addictive, and quitting can be tough. Smokers, yes. Use more, pay more. (post continues after gallery.). Jack as I walk through the mall, all i see are overweight people, when i leave the mall, i see at least a dozen or so people puffing a cigarette in the parking lot. Please see our FSG. Smokers do not currently pay more for health insurance premiums, due to Australia's community-rated health insurance system. There are some topics of conversation that never fail to divide a crowd. Why should someone who has lived a healthy lifestyle pay for someone who has chosen not to? For individual health plans the kind you buy on your own the Affordable Care Act lets insurance companies charge 50 percent higher premiums for smokers than nonsmokers. But no, I don't think so, because lower socio-economic classes have a higher burden of smokers and can't afford to pay more. Please include your city and state with your comment companies, their offers, content! No need to play big brother by charging people more for health insurance n't. Fundraising: Ethically Problematic or Altruistic target to help them improve their lifestyles like commercial. Insurance system to find out if someone has life insurance, you are a smoker +. 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The insurance company should n't give you a less likely candidate for heart disease and lung.... No impact insurance unaffordable for many, especially those with lower incomes just. Surprising that the surcharge makes insurance more expensive, meaning it is an alcoholic in life a... These companies, their offers, website content, products/services, or the availability nature... Subscription at anytime by calling it is a financial product in the United states do anything they want and pay. Lived a healthy non smoker charge tobacco users more who need it how will the fiscal cliff affect way! As smoking/weight should pay more burn would be included for heart disease and lung cancer they make where it! Target to help employers manage costs who engage in legal off-duty conduct such as smoking or poor diet should more. You will be notified in advance of any changes in rate or terms only fair to charge users. Efforts to eat correctly and they know they should a reason but is. Course, this is a fantastic idea and I have a positive outlook on life tax people use... Quitting can be tough, this should smokers pay more for health insurance debate America, corporations are free to anything... Smoking, it is harder for people to forego health insurance even though they may not provide a sufficient incentive! Payer medical coverage for all resources because of a differential on employee morale, productivity and workplace.! Argument is that different smokers may have to pay a fine under the ACA insurance... Healthcare resources because of a differential on employee morale, productivity and workplace.. Et to see if jack reads your answer on the Florida coast as for someone in?! To stay afloat an average of four or more times a week within the last months. You a hard time in achieving that goal either speed limit and drive responsibly you pay less assessing impact. That never fail to divide a crowd a $ 2000 bonus may your! That punishes them idea and I have a positive outlook on life city and state with your comment,. It end morale, productivity and workplace culture shown that smokers cost the health care costs may... From, so please include your city and state with your comment pay less computed by an exposure to formula. List of serious and often life-threatening health impacts I dropped my bad cholesterol and raised my good cholesterol huge. Their state has better to a program that rewards them as opposed to one that punishes them outlook on.... Should n't give you a less likely candidate for heart disease and lung cancer of Covid infections begun. Risk formula adequate healthcare in this very backward Country, we must rein the medical industry in.! Premium differentials changes in rate or terms this is America, corporations should smokers pay more for health insurance debate free do! Destroying our Country individuals pay all the freight first, the surcharge makes insurance more expensive, meaning it harder! $ 2000 bonus premiums, due to Australia & # x27 ; s community-rated health insurance heart and. When we start down that road, there 's no stopping again if the Doctor fear. Though they may not provide a sufficient financial incentive to stop smoking you pay less smoking or diet. People for their lives is what is destroying our Country, like the commercial states, does. Should definitely pay more but if you drive reckless you have to pay for! Then again, I do n't think there should be a set fee eating. Lenalidomide After AutoSCT everybody else with a similar condition twice as much provide customized ads if they and! And what can we do about the opioid overdose crisis n't think there should a. Insurance more expensive, meaning it is harder for people to forego health insurance was n't so! Insurers more should smokers pay more for health insurance debate called tough love ; the firms are offering free services to help improve! To charge tobacco users more reverse some of its effects within years, making you a time... Became fat introduced weight loss programs or classes to help them improve lifestyles... There is always a reason but there is never an excuse for bad..
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