Insurance Space

First adopted for auto, property and casualty insurance under Proposition 103, “prior approval” or “rate regulation,” as it is known, has saved consumers billions of dollars. That’s why I am reintroducing legislation that would extend Proposition 103 to health insurance. Why would California provide less government oversight for health insurance – which can save people’s lives – than for auto insurance?

Today, the state Department of Insurance has only limited ability to explore whether the benefits covered by a health insurance policy are proportional to the premiums paid. If less than 70 percent of health care premium dollars are spent on providing health care, the insurance commissioner may investigate. Unfortunately, these “medical loss ratios” can be manipulated, and thus Californians have been hit with rate increase after rate increase with no intervention by the state.

Consumers in at least four states who buy their own health insurance are getting hit with premium increases of 15 percent or more — and people in other states could see the same thing.

Anthem Blue Cross, a subsidiary of WellPoint Inc., has been under fire for a week from regulators and politicians for notifying some of its 800,000 individual policyholders in California that it plans to raise rates by up to 39 percent March 1.

The Anthem Blue Cross plan in Maine is asking for increases of about 23 percent this year for some individual policyholders. Last year, they raised rates up to 32 percent.

US insurer MetLife is to acquire American International Group’s (AIG) insurance business in a deal worth $15 million, news reports have claimed.

MetLife, which is the largest insurance company in the US, is expected to offer AIG $8 million in stock and the rest in cash for the purchase of Alico.

Up to $5 billion of the funds is thought to be coming from a bridge loan from banks including Bank of America, JPMorgan, Credit Suisse Group and Deutsche Bank.

If the Green River rises over its banks, there’s a chance that people all over Washington could help pay for the damage.

State leaders are contemplating the creation of a state-run insurance pool that would help businesses in Kent, Auburn and other communities along the river.

The companies have struggled to find insurance companies that will sell them flood insurance since rains last year weakened a hillside next to Howard Hanson Dam.

The state Senate voted 30-18 Tuesday to authorize the state insurance commissioner to create such a “joint underwriting association.” Senate Bill 6240 now goes to the House.

The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote later this week on whether to repeal a decades-long anti-trust exemption for health insurance companies.

It’s a small piece of what was included in the original House health care reform bill. It would be the first major legislative action on overhauling health care since Democrats lost their supermajority in the Senate last month. Insurers say Congress should leave the exemption alone, but others say repealing it would lead to lower premiums.

One of the strongest supporters of a bill to prohibit health insurance companies from setting annual and lifetime limits on the amounts they will pay couldn’t be at a legislative hearing on the measure Wednesday because he has cancer and was getting a blood transfusion.

Since Richard “Rocky” D’Andrea’s cancer was discovered in 2008, the 63-year-old Limerick man also found out that his insurance policy carried a $250,000 lifetime cap, his wife Theresa told the Insurance and Financial Services Committee. Now the couple are struggling to keep their house. Their credit cards are maxed and they’ve spent all of their savings and retirement, she said.

Americans want to be covered by health insurance, but which one is best? Are there any we should watch-out for? Experts warn that some plans don’t cover enough and others aren’t accepted by enough doctors.

Now that health care is stalled in Congress, there is a surge in health insurance offers both online and on the television. But be careful. There are two types of plans watchdogs are worried about, according to Elizabeth Leamy with the ABC network.