Participate in shaping health care reform
To our partners:
Our industry may be at a crossroads. Each day news reports are flooded with changes to the proposed health care reform, confrontation at town hall meetings or a new twist in Congressional debate. Now we are asking you to join in the conversation. Specifically, we are asking you to contact your Congressional representatives.
The Issue
Included in health care reforms making their way through Congress are proposals requiring Americans to have health insurance that includes a minimum or “essential” benefits package. In addition to the range of medical services, the proposed essential benefits package would include children’s dental services. In some bills the “essential benefits” requirement applies to coverage obtained through new Health Insurance “Exchanges” for individuals and small businesses; in other bills it would eventually apply to all health insurance in the private market as well.
While it is positive to have the importance of children’s dental needs recognized by federal policymakers, the Congressional proposals would shift children’s dental coverage to medical plans only, rather than allow specialized dental plans to directly offer the stand-alone benefits of dental insurance carriers.
When contacting members of Congress, please ask them to allow stand-alone dental (and vision) benefits to meet any essential dental (or vision) coverage required under health reform.
Why?
72 percent of all employers offer dental benefits as part of their benefit packages, and 132 million Americans currently have family coverage through their employers (another 20 million have individual coverage.)
At a time when Congress is working to expand coverage and contain costs, medical plans would either need to build systems that duplicate those of specialized dental carriers or subcontract to cover the dental coverage portion of the essentials benefits package, adding unnecessary administrative costs for the medical plans and an increase in the premium for the dental portion of coverage.
Further, the promise that people who like their coverage can keep it will not be met for 132 million Americans that will have to drop their current family dental benefits to purchase their children’s dental coverage through a medical plan.
- If the required children’s dental coverage is limited and they also maintain their private dental coverage, the same dentist may not participate in both plans making treatment disjointed.
- If the required children’s dental coverage is robust, some adults may drop their own dental coverage when the children’s portion is removed.
We hope you will join us by asking your congressional representatives to commit to reaching out to congressional leadership and the health committee chairman to raise their concerns about the impact on stand-alone dental plans.
Sincerely,
John Roberts
President & CEO
Assurant Employee Benefits