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Mental health insurance debated
(Columbian, The (Vancouver, WA) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Feb. 9--OLYMPIA -- Advocates for the mentally ill urged a Senate committee Thursday to guarantee that even employees of small companies get insurance coverage for mental disabilities equal to their coverage for medical conditions.
In often compelling testimony, they argued that an employee who suffers from a psychotic condition such as clinical depression or bipolar disorder typically costs the employer -- and society as a whole -- far more than the small increase in the cost of insurance premiums required to provide mental health parity.
Sean Corry, an insurance broker and a member of the Washington Coalition for Insurance Parity, told the Senate Health and Long-Term Care Committee that sufferers from depression typically experience higher absenteeism, file more disability claims and are less productive than their co-workers.
"The benefits (of coverage) far outweigh the premium costs," Corry said. He estimated that increased cost at less than 1 percent for group plans and up to 1.5 percent for individual plans.
The coalition has more than 110 small-business members, including the Vancouver Farmers Market and 16 other Vancouver businesses.
Tamera Alkire, owner of an Edmonds piano-moving company that employs 10 workers, described her shock when her son, who was also her employee, began experiencing psychotic episodes in 2003. That shock deepened, she said, when she learned how inadequate her company's mental health coverage was.
"After my son's four emergency-room visits and a 20-day hospitalization, we discovered my company's health plan only covered 12 of those days," she said. And although her son left the hospital with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder and instructions to see a psychiatrist four times a month, "our insurance only covered 12 outpatient visits a year," Alkire said.
"The extremely limited insurance coverage forced my son to seek assistance from the state," she said.
She discovered she could not purchase better mental health coverage for her small business in Washington.
Earlier action
The 2005 Legislature passed a mental health parity bill that applies to all commercial insurance policies covering more than 50 employees and to policies the state provides to its own employees.
Senate Bill 5446 would extend that requirement to companies with fewer than 50 employees and also require individual policies to offer mental health benefits equal to their medical benefits. It could potentially affect 540,000 Washington residents.
A survey by the Coalition for Insurance Parity found wide disparities in small-group plans offered in Washington. The largest involved limits on coverage. Of four policies surveyed, none limited the number of hospital inpatient or outpatient days covered for medical treatment. But all limited coverage for mental health treatment to eight inpatient days and 12 outpatient days per year.
None of the four individual policies included coverage for health treatment.
"There is no coverage in the individual market," Corry said. "This is just plain wrong."
Lisa Stone, executive director of the Northwest Women's Law Center, which employs 10 people, said the $45,000 a year her nonprofit pays for comprehensive care pays off in satisfied and stable employees in her 10-person office.
"The cost of replacing an employee far exceeds the incremental cost of this coverage," she said.
The absence of mental health coverage in individual plans hits a vulnerable population, said psychologist Lucy Humans. "By a cruel twist of fate, young adults go off their parents' plans and into the individual market at the same time they may be experiencing the onset" of a severe psychiatric disorder, she said.
Opposition
Testifying against the bill, Melani McAleenan, a lobbyist for the Washington Association of Business, said her organization opposes additional mandates for insurance carriers. She noted that the Blue Ribbon Commission on Health Care Cost and Access, which has recommended reforms in the state's health care system, "did not advocate adding more mandates to our overburdened system."
"Mandates are supposed to improve coverage, but they actually cause people to lose coverage," she said. "The way to increase coverage is to make less-expensive plans available."
Also testifying against the bill was Nancee Wildermuth, a lobbyist for Regence Blue Cross Blue Shield. "We do oppose mandates," she said. "We think they are a bad way to design policies."
Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane, said Thursday that the bill has a good chance of passing the Senate this year because of bipartisan support.
Update
--Previously: The 2005 Legislature passed a mental health parity bill requiring that all large-group health insurance policies provide equal coverage for medical and mental health treatment by 2010.
--What's new: A Senate bill heard Thursday would extend mental health parity to small-group and individual policies.
--What's next: If the Senate Health and Long-Term Care Committee passes the bill, it will advance to the full Senate for a vote.
Copyright (c) 2007, The Columbian, Vancouver, Wash.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
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