Tobacco smokers to pay 50% more for Obamacare!

[Vocalek]

No, I actually did not.

Actuaries in insurance companies operate on percentages and risk analysis.


Is vaping 100% safe? Can we prove that vaping is at the same risk level as someone who doesn't smoke at all, doesn't inhale anything at all into their lungs except air?

If you cannot prove that, and there are no studies to prove that, then they are going to access a certain risk to that behavior. Ditto, to SNUS.


Is nicotine 100% safe? Not according to any surgeon I've ever had, since it does slow healing esp skin/wound healing. I needed elective surgery when I was smoking, could not find anyone to operate on me. I asked if I could just wear a nicotine patch, answer was no. There are ample studies on nicotine and delayed wound healing. My surgeons didn't make up nicotine's vasoconstrictive properties.


I sign each and every petition and write to my legislators to support vaping. But I don't take any of the rest of that stuff personally and am not about to develop a persecution complex over it. It's not fair, but since I am used to how insurance companies operate, I'm not suprised.

It's how insurance companies operate. I don't care who is President... they operated like that before obama, and are still doing it.

If anything, our legistlators should get insurance companies to change their practices. Therein lies the problem----in my lifetime, neither party has 'taken them on' ..... not really. I've known people who died while waiting for insurance companies to provide authorization for necessary medical treatment.

I've had to take an insurance company to court.....so I know all about *fighting* it out. I did that work. I know the song.

Is nicotine 100% safe? No, according to the epidemiological evidence, nicotine from smokeless tobacco is only 99% less hazardous than smoking. But wouldn't you say that reducing your risks by 99% is something that the actuaries ought to be paying attention to when they determine how much to charge?

There are no long term studies on use of nicotine replacement therapy products like nicotine gum, so the FDA is considering the evidence on the 99% safer profile of nicotine from smokeless tobacco to extrapolate that long term use of NRTs is probably reasonably safe (and CERTAINLY much safer than continuing to or relapsing to smoking, wouldn't you agree?)

And we here at ECF feel that if the smokeless tobacco is safer evidence can be extrapolated to NRTs, there is no reason to believe that use of e-cigarettes would be much more hazardous to health. And if there is something inherently dangerous about using e-cigarettes, how do we explain the fact that those of us who smoked long enough to get smoker's cough, wheezing, and coughing jags when attempting to laugh have seen those symptoms disappearing once we switched?

If all you know about other types of tobacco you learned from the web sites of the FDA, CDC, American Heart Assn, American Lung Assn, and American Cancer Society, you have some learning to do, because those sites LIE. I must give them credit for lying very cleverly. They say, "There is no safe tobacco product" (which is not 100% untrue) but they "conveniently" forget to mention the fact that smoking is much, much more hazardous than other forms of tobacco use.

I recommend you start with these web sites:

Tobaccoharmreduction.org
For Smokers Only
http://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.com/
CASAA - The Consumer Advocates for Smoke-free Alternatives Association

You will find plenty of scientific citations on these sites to peer-reviewed journal articles concerning snus and other smokeless tobacco.

Bottom line is that the science does not support the insurance companies price-gouging people that have taken steps to improve their health by continuing to punish them as if they were still smokers. And that missing actuarial proof is what we could have taken the insurance companies to court over -- if only our overly generous president had told them point blank they were welcome to overcharge "tobacco users" by an extra 50%.

/*Rant over*/

 

[Petrodus]

Is Chantix 100% Safe ??

It's all about agendas and money
and little to do with public health

 

[Racehorse]

wouldn't you say that reducing your risks by 99% is something that the actuaries ought to be paying attention to when they determine how much to charge?

I vape, and have proof that it has improved my health. I have background in tracing legislative histories, grantwriting, etc. so I'm conversant about how laws become codified in the aftermath of conflicting studies and research, and in the face of industry-funded medical reports, secret internal documents, backroom deals and lies.

"Selling Quit" to 50+ million smokers is a lucrative enterprise, by any account.

We are in agreement.

I was just stating the facts, i.e. how insurance companies have always operated. Not that I agreed with their SOP. Insurance companies were offering non-smokers discounts on life insurance back in 1964.....so dinging smokers, as this topic began, is nothing new.

Bottom line is that the science does not support the insurance companies price-gouging people

It hasn't for the 59 years I've been alive. That didn't seem to help people who were unfairly placed into high risk categories under multiple Administrations, nor myself being denied health coverage for pre-existing conditions when that was still legal .

Let me be frank: despite the fact that insurance companies have been operating like this for as long as I have been alive, and Big Pharma, FDA, and Big Insurance have had everyone over a barrel for the duration, the headings about this subject on this forum seem always politicized in a partisan way ..............despite that many Administrations have had AMPLE opportunity to reign in Big Pharma, Big Insurance, and the FDA.

But they haven't.

I have been to countless Quit Smoking programs since 1998, and I can assure you that I was never offered SNUS. Only expensive and somewhat dangerous (to me) pharmaceutical interventions.

15 years have passed and of course it's wrong!


So----I guess my one request would be to realize that many vapers here are pro republican and many vapers here are pro democrat-----and some are neither. I just prefer not to see our situation reduced to a partisan issue, first of all, because it is not, and secondly, because I believe that knee-jerk identity politics is devisive to communities.

Vapers of all political (and even apolitical) persuasions should be equally respected here, and I don't feel that can truly be accomplished inside of this somewhat creeping partisan *tone* that often to pervades these discussions.

 

[Insignificance]

Is Chantix 100% Safe ??

It's all about agendas and money
and little to do with public health

Judging by my experience, no. I was on that for two weeks and once the incessant nausea passed I started to have suicidal thoughts (something, up to the point of taking it, I have never pondered once). I called my doctor and he told me to stop immediately and if the suicidal thoughts continued and I felt that I was going to act on them to go to a hospital and have myself voluntarily committed.
Stopping smoking the "right" way was so much fun.

 

[jkos]

May be this is to simple,As far as the 50% penalty goes when you fill out the form do you smoke or use tobacco? I will do what the FDA and government does, I will LIE! LIE! LIE! DENY! DENY! DENY! Remember its not a LIE if you believe it,(George Castanzia)

 

[Petrodus]

As most know ... Chicago is BROKE (like so many other cities)
and can't afford to meet its obligations for funding health care
contracts for retirees.

Just heard on the News its considering shifting the expense to
Federal tax payers by not paying the bill forcing those retirees
on the Obama Care Exchange ... Problem Solved !!


Wait a minute ...
If one bankrupt city does this ... Others will also.
Mmmmm ....
Wouldn't that effect the price the citizens pay for Obama Care ??

 

[Vocalek]

This story from the Washington Post discusses the regulations:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/11/20/three-ways-obamacare-changed-today/

 

[Petrodus]

I posted earlier Chicago Mayor may add billions more to the
Obama Care tab by dumping his city's retirees on the federally
subsidized state health exchange.

Article: Click Here

The cost to national taxpayers would be enormous,
especially if other local and state governments joined the party.

Once again...Obama Care provides a convenient mechanism
and incentives to transfer health-care liabilities to national taxpayers.

For the benefit of all those Obama Care supporters who were
dancing in the streets when it was voted into law Without Even Reading It ...
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

 

[Petrodus]

Another article on the same subject: LINK

 

[FloridaNoob]

I have to agree, it does suck to have us lumped in with the tobacco users. I do however understand the reasons why insurance companies charge higher rates, and raise them for certain issues. Whether anyone likes it or not they are a business and businesses are meant to make a profit. That being said the insurance industry as a whole actually makes only a 3% profit. However, certain news outlets when they reported the increase from 2% to 3% profit increase, a whopping 1%, they reported that the insurance industry had increased their profits by 50%. While technically accurate it conveys a much more evil spin on health insurance. In reality some insurance companies are actually operating in the red this last year due to the changes made by this health care plan.

People worrying about being tested while in the hospital for nicotine and their claims being denied are alarmists. First your insurance cannot require a healthcare provider to perform such a test, nor can the provider run a test on you without your consent. So telling your insurance company you are a non-smoker is fine.

I honestly cannot completely disagree with them actually raising these premiums on us as former smokers. We did smoke for many years most of us over 10 causing health issues that will cause our medical expenses to be higher for the insurance companies. Yes we have gone onto a healthier alternative, but most of that damage has already been done. We have already laid the seeds for us to get cancer, and by our use of nicotine increase the rate at which the tumors will grow. I say this last part based on recent medical findings on nicotine and increasing blood vessel growth, which can be a good thing, but with tumors causes them to grow more rapidly.

How is it different than a buffet charging more for an adult over a child for all you can eat? I mean my wife as an adult would eat a birds portion, and my son when younger would have cleaned out 6+ plates of food w/o a problem. The risk is for the adult to cost more in food than the child. Just like the tobacco user has a higher risk to cost more medically.

 

[jazon1]

personally i think healthcare in the usa is about as corrupt as our government,
a few years back i was insured from bluecross i was out in the desert welding on a silo and inhaled a desert mold spore(cocci) and a few weeks later got very sick and lasted months needless to say 6 months later me and my wife decided to move back east to be with our family to give us some support in those difficult times.

well before moving home we called my insurance and asked if it was going to be a problem to transfer my insurance to that state and if anything would change they said no it would not change anything just that we had to transfer the plan to that state,and because i was a member before getting sick that the rates would stay the same.

well when we got back to our family's and started to get me back in with a DR (i had to go weekly back then) we called bluecross they said the insurance was getting closed to me and that they could no longer insure me because we moved,we told them what we had been told by them before moving and that we would get a lawyer involved if necessary and they said they would call us back in a few days. they called back the next day and told me i could keep my insurance if i payed them $700 a month! i was paying them about $150 before the move neadless to say i canceled the plan it was cheaper to not have insurance and just pay the DR cash.

insurance in this country is pretty bad and unfair and is all about the money they only want to insure people who dont need it or use it so they can just keep pocketing the money and never have to pay out,
so i agree something needed to be done to fix this here but obama care? im thinking we were better off before.

 

[Whodoo]

What would be the ramifications of using 0 nic juice for a month before taking a health test for insurance? I'm an honest person, but last year was quoted rates for life insurance. At that time I was smoking & the monthly rate was double that of a smoker...and i'm only 37.

A good friend of mine still smokes, quit for a month in order to get life insurance & then started right back up. He passed the test.

FWIW - my condo homeowners insurance is $245 a year. As I smoker I would have paid $250 a month for life insurance. I won't get tested for life insurance for a few more months, but definitely don't plan on having nicotine in my system when the test comes around.

 

[Petrodus]

Oops, Now the Unions Tell Us They Don’t Like ObamaCare

Click Here

 

[Whodoo]

As time goes on we're going to hear a lot of professionals dissatisfied with Obama care. A good friend runs an Optometrist office in town. The govt forced them to switch the database software that their office uses for its daily operation. The new software is so bad, so tedious & immature that the Dr had to hire an additional secretary. The big gripe is they have over 20 different screens in which to enter a patients info...but each page has similar fields like name, address, insurance carrier, etc. Their old software would automatically copy the info & populate each page, the new stuff doesn't. Probably just one small example, but one we heard plenty about at a recent dinner party!

 

[Petrodus]

You won't hear about all the disasters with Obamacare
in the State Run Media.

 

[DC2]

People worrying about being tested while in the hospital for nicotine and their claims being denied are alarmists. First your insurance cannot require a healthcare provider to perform such a test, nor can the provider run a test on you without your consent. So telling your insurance company you are a non-smoker is fine.

I would really like to see this discussed in more detail by people in the know.
I have seen people in the insurance industry who have warned very strongly against this.

I honestly cannot completely disagree with them actually raising these premiums on us as former smokers. We did smoke for many years most of us over 10 causing health issues that will cause our medical expenses to be higher for the insurance companies. Yes we have gone onto a healthier alternative, but most of that damage has already been done. We have already laid the seeds for us to get cancer, and by our use of nicotine increase the rate at which the tumors will grow. I say this last part based on recent medical findings on nicotine and increasing blood vessel growth, which can be a good thing, but with tumors causes them to grow more rapidly.

Interesting thoughts, and they seem to make sense.

Although, again, I have seen MANY people argue that smokers SAVE money on health care costs.
Apparently there have been analysis run that indicate smokers die younger and therefore fail to incur as much long-term cost.

That's another item up for debate I guess.

 

[Dulce]

I would expect to see much more of this. I imagine the annual physicals that are being touted as free will very soon become mandatory. Alot of data will be collected, from cigarette usage, weight gain, body fat, cholestoral levels, etc, will determine your rates. Poor performance will be given higher rates while giving you incentives to increase over the next year, such as reduce body fat b x% or reduce cholesterol by y%.

Quite frankly, the system can not pay for itself and they will need to find reasons to charge people more than the govt price caps. Although I don't see this reducing health care costs. End of life care is still going to be astronomical at 75 years old versus 55 years old.

 

[Fiamma]

I would really like to see this discussed in more detail by people in the know.
I have seen people in the insurance industry who have warned very strongly against this.


Interesting thoughts, and they seem to make sense.

Although, again, I have seen MANY people argue that smokers SAVE money on health care costs.
Apparently there have been analysis run that indicate smokers die younger and therefore fail to incur as much long-term cost.

That's another item up for debate I guess.

I saw a study done in the UK that says they take in far more in taxes on smokers than they pay out in healthcare and pensions to smokers. I will try to remember where I read it. A UK blog most probably or a news report.

 

[Vocalek]

Oops, Now the Unions Tell Us They Don’t Like ObamaCare

Click Here

My husband was reading me the original article in the Wall Street Journal--and laughing a lot.

 

[DC2]

I would expect to see much more of this. I imagine the annual physicals that are being touted as free will very soon become mandatory. Alot of data will be collected, from cigarette usage, weight gain, body fat, cholestoral levels, etc, will determine your rates. Poor performance will be given higher rates while giving you incentives to increase over the next year, such as reduce body fat b x% or reduce cholesterol by y%.

Quite frankly, the system can not pay for itself and they will need to find reasons to charge people more than the govt price caps. Although I don't see this reducing health care costs. End of life care is still going to be astronomical at 75 years old versus 55 years old.

I think you've pretty much nailed it.