Insurers Set to End Sick Kids’ Policies
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This Thursday, Sept. 23, several key components of the health care reform law go into effect, including a ban on denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. But just this week, several large health insurers began an end-run around the law when they announced that rather than cover kids, they’ll get out of the business of selling children’s policies.
That action, says Ethan Rome, executive director of Health Care for America Now (HCAN), is “immoral…appalling…and dishonest.”
We’re just days away from a new era when insurance companies must stop denying coverage to kids just because they are sick, and now some of the biggest changed their minds and decided to refuse to sell child-only coverage. The latest announcement by the insurance companies that they won’t cover kids is immoral, and to blame their appalling behavior on the new law is patently dishonest.
Today: We Tell Health Insurers Stop the Hikes, Back Reform
Today, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka is leading a large union contingent in a march from the AFL-CIO and AFSCME buildings to a mass rally at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Washington, D.C., during the meeting of the big insurance industry front group, the America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP).
Many unions and union-related groups are working together on the rally, but some are making a major effort, including AFSCME, AFGE, AFT, Communications Workers of America (CWA), Office and Professional Employees (OPEIU), Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), United Steelworkers (USW), United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), SEIU, Alliance for Retired Americans, Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW), Pride At Work, Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA) and Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ).
Join us here where James Parks and Danielle Hatchett from our online team will live tweet the march and rally, starting at 10 a.m. Follow #m9 for the latest updates on Twitter from some of the thousands of participants expected to attend.
