The idea of health insurance vouchers is the worst idea since the Republicans told us we would love HMOs. John McCarron (Commentary, Feb. 14) is right–there will be a health insurance revolution if vouchers replace employer health insurance. The revolution can’t start soon enough. People do not realize that if any member of your family has a pre-existing health problem, no insurance company will accept your voucher. It doesn’t matter if your voucher is $4,000 or $40,000; insurance companies will not insure your family. Insurance companies will turn down the whole family if any family member has a health problem as common as asthma.
Because millions of families have members with pre-existing conditions, vouchers would force them to become uninsured.
If employers abandon group health insurance, then the only way to insure families with pre-existing conditions will be a government universal health insurance like Medicare.
America is running out of alternatives to universal heath insurance.
