COBRA Alternatives for Uninsured Pregnant Women
Posted by Advocate Aaron on May 21, 2009 · Leave a Comment
If your pregnant and recently lost your job due to layoffs, you’ve probably been offered COBRA – an opportunity to continue to receive health insurance benefits provided that you pay for them. And, you’ve probably discovered that COBRA is expensive – extravagantly so.
If you’re eligible for COBRA, the stimulus plan has provisions to subsidize 65% of your premium until December 31, 2009. That means that if your monthly COBRA premium is $1,000, you will actually pay $350 – still a large chunk of change, especially when you’ve recently lost your income.
eHealthInsurance.com has instituted a new COBRA comparison tool (https://www.ehealthinsurance.com/ehi/health-insurance/cobra-learning-center.html?allid=Com22130) that allows you input your COBRA premium, find out what your subsidized payment would be if you take COBRA coverage, and then offers alternative individual and family health care plans.
WARNING: Watch what you sign up for. While the eHealthInsurance.com tool seems to offer excellent COBRA alternatives (starting at around $50 per month for a 29 year old woman, depending on location and health history), certain factors can turn appealing offers into nightmares laden with shortcomings.
For example, a plan with a $50 premium might sound good, but when you take a closer look you might find that you have a $10,000 deductible, a 20% co-pay, and that the plan DOES NOT COVER PRENATAL CARE OR HOSPITAL DELIVERY. At the end of the day, such a plan would not offer much of a benefit to pregnant women at all; despite the $300/month premium savings over COBRA.
The bottom line is that comprehensive health insurance policies are not cheap – so don’t be fooled by affordable policies that will come up short when you need them the most.
