Health Insurance Rant
Tuesday, August 23rd, 2005 03:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniI don't think I've fussed about Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield lately. It was easier to just pay the usurious monthly bill, shoulder the impo$$ible deductible and just hopetoGHOD they would actually pay out if-and-when either of us actually needs catastrophic health care, and without burdening whichever of us is doing caretaking with fifteen thousand obnoxious bureaucratic demands. Call me a crazy dreamer.
Anyhow, in today's mail comes a Slick Advertising Piece(tm) from the good folks at Anthem, urging me to log!on!right!now! to anthemrewards.com and start!earning!points! toward useless, stupid chatchkes. Ten!Points! for every thirty minutes of exercise logged! Twenty-five bonus!! points! just for signing up! Accumulate 250 points and I'm eligible for a t-shirt, keep saving and I could collect a sleeping bag, a Swiss Army watch, or a sports bag! And That's Just The Beginning!
Now, dammit...
How stupid do you have to be to NOT UNDERSTAND that people in Maine, the great majority of whom are, by report, underinsured or not insured at all, which is directly attributable to the high cost of health insurance, want -- stay with me now -- relief from the high cost of health insurance. Not sleeping bags; not soccer balls, or t-shirts. Relief. Monetary relief.
You want a Rewards program that will engage people? Here's one: Give me five bucks off my monthly premium for every time I go to the gym. Ten bucks for participating in a marathon. Fifty cents for every mile I ride my bike. Or maybe we could rack up points that could be used for something useful -- preventative care visits, say; annual exams; flu shots.
Mind you, I don't expect any of this to happen. Anthem has a PR problem in Maine, for some reason, and everybody knows that the way to make the kids like you is to give them candy.
Anyhow, in today's mail comes a Slick Advertising Piece(tm) from the good folks at Anthem, urging me to log!on!right!now! to anthemrewards.com and start!earning!points! toward useless, stupid chatchkes. Ten!Points! for every thirty minutes of exercise logged! Twenty-five bonus!! points! just for signing up! Accumulate 250 points and I'm eligible for a t-shirt, keep saving and I could collect a sleeping bag, a Swiss Army watch, or a sports bag! And That's Just The Beginning!
Now, dammit...
How stupid do you have to be to NOT UNDERSTAND that people in Maine, the great majority of whom are, by report, underinsured or not insured at all, which is directly attributable to the high cost of health insurance, want -- stay with me now -- relief from the high cost of health insurance. Not sleeping bags; not soccer balls, or t-shirts. Relief. Monetary relief.
You want a Rewards program that will engage people? Here's one: Give me five bucks off my monthly premium for every time I go to the gym. Ten bucks for participating in a marathon. Fifty cents for every mile I ride my bike. Or maybe we could rack up points that could be used for something useful -- preventative care visits, say; annual exams; flu shots.
Mind you, I don't expect any of this to happen. Anthem has a PR problem in Maine, for some reason, and everybody knows that the way to make the kids like you is to give them candy.
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no subject
Date: 2005-08-23 01:32 pm (UTC)My spouse works for the federal govt, and we still pay a substantial monthly premium for our health insurance.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-23 01:52 pm (UTC)Have you guys ever checked into that Dirigo Health program? I skipped over it, after learning it was administered by . . . Anthem.
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Date: 2005-08-23 02:27 pm (UTC)Next week: a $Billion multimedia campaign to get people to buy gasoline! No, wait, we already do that...
no subject
Date: 2005-08-23 04:58 pm (UTC)Jack (another person paying for individual health insurance)
Health insurance rewards
Date: 2005-08-24 02:24 pm (UTC)I'm ordinarily not one to defend insurance companies (parasites though they be), but I sort of get where they're coming from. They want to promote some sort of increase in fitness (and a commensurate drop in claims later) and this is a relatively cheap way to do it. But, since it's all based on an honor-system, they have to assume their clients are lying to them and give out these cornball "prizes" lest they encounter "Why I'm shocked and offended that you disbelieve my claim that I bike three hours a day every single day and twice on Sunday! Now give me my free cholesterol pills!" =(
Remind me again why we call American society civilized again?