Health costs bankrupting middle class

By Mary Kemen

One need only examine the state of health care in this country to see one more nail in the coffin of middle class workers. Statistics from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation show that the middle class is losing health insurance coverage faster than any other income group.

Between 2000 and 2008, more than 2 million middle-income workers joined the ranks of the uninsured. Only two-thirds of people in families earning between $45,000 and $85,000 have employer-based health insurance. From 2000 to 2008, the cost for an employer to insure a family increased 55.6 percent, while the cost to employees rose 80.5 percent. Meanwhile, median household income decreased 3.5 percent.

The government provides some form of coverage for only half of those who lose insurance, leaving the rest to seek out free health clinics and hospital emergency departments.

A Harvard study once again has shown that illness and medical expenses remain the leading cause of personal bankruptcy. In 2007,

62 percent of all personal bankruptcies resulted from major medical illness, yet 78 percent of those affected had heath insurance at the onset of illness. Two-thirds of these people owned their home and three-fifths had attended college. For those who had insurance, the average out-of-pocket expenses incurred were $17,749. For the uninsured, average expenses accrued were $26,971. With median U.S. income at $51,233, these figures represent an overwhelming burden.

To see how the other half lives, the insurance companies provide a rich cornucopia of excess. Anthem Blue Cross just announced an average 25 percent premium increase for 700,000 California customers. WellPoint, its parent company, posted a $2.7 billion profit last quarter and CEO Angela Braly earned $9.8 million last year. In 2009, the five largest insurance companies listed profits of

$12.2 billion, an increase of 56 percent over 2008. Yet they provided coverage for 2.7 million fewer people. Three-fifths of these companies spent less of each premium dollar paid on medical care, putting more into administrative costs, salaries and profits.

As fewer patients are covered and with less benefits, the major beneficiaries of health

insurance have become the stockholders and CEOs.

This is reprehensible. We are the only industrialized nation that looks the other way while 46 million go without access to basic health care. The state of our health care system has significantly impacted liberty and, if unchanged by the reform effort, the human and financial cost will be unconscionable.

Dr. Mary Kemen is an anesthesiologist in Cedar Rapids.