Health Care Reform Sends Clear Message on Prevention
This continues my series of posts on how health care reform affects retirees, starting with my first post, Health Care Reform: Don't Count on Retiring Early. By now, hopefully you've read about health care reform's more significant features, such as partially closing Medicare's donut hole, mandating almost everyone have health insurance, and banning such troublesome practices as exclusions for pre-existing conditions and insurance companies' rescinding coverage for sick people.
But health care reform also aims to improve the health of all Americans. After all, health insurance will eventually cost less if we're all healthier.
Starting in 2011, all new individual insurance and group health plans must offer preventative services for no additional out-of-pocket charges to consumers. Covered services include immunizations, cancer screenings and checkups. This is a welcome new focus, by moving from an insurance model that was focused on treating illness and injury to one that encourages a healthier population.
It's not quite clear what's going to be required for existing individual insurance and group health plans; this will be defined by forthcoming regulations from the Department of Health and Human Services. If you're in a group health plan at work, however, it's likely that preventative services are already covered with no additional out-of-pocket charges, since this is a popular feature of employer-sponsored health plans.
What is clear is that Medicare will be offering preventative services for no out-of-pocket charges by 2011, and the state-sponsored health insurance exchanges will offer them when these exchanges become operational in 2014.
I believe that the potential high cost of medical and long-term care bills pose just as great a threat to our retirement as inadequate 401(k) balances and other financial resources. So encouraging preventative services is indeed a step in the right direction. However, as the old saying goes, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." Will you be smart enough to take advantage of these free preventative services?
More important, will you make the most effective changes needed: getting more exercise and adopting a healthier diet? These steps can dramatically decrease your odds of contracting expensive, chronic conditions and significantly increase your ability to enjoy life in your retirement years, as discussed in my post Looking for the Longevity Pill.
For a succinct list of recommended action steps to help you enjoy your retirement years more, please look at this video clip of an interview with Dr. Bob Hoffman from my DVD, The Quest: For Long Life, Health and Prosperity. It tells you all you need to know in just 60 seconds!
Stay tuned as we all learn more about the significant implications of health care reform, and join me in taking the steps that improve the odds of living a long, healthy life.
View all articles by Steve Vernon on CBS MoneyWatch»
Steve Vernon helped large employers design and manage their retirement programs for more than 35 years as a consulting actuary. Now he's a research scholar for the Stanford Center on Longevity, where he helps collect, direct and disseminate research that will improve the financial security of seniors. He's also president of Rest-of-Life Communications, delivers retirement planning workshops
and authored Retirement Game-Changers: Strategies for a Healthy, Financially Secure and Fulfilling Long Life and Money for Life: Turn Your IRA and 401(k) Into a Lifetime Retirement Paycheck.
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