Bringing Health Reform Home: Consumer Protections In Your State

A few recent stories on how health reform might affect Californians are worth your time: The Los Angeles Times' Lisa Girion's  Dec. 18 story and Nov. 16 article on the implications of less-stringent federal consumer protections for Californians, who now enjoy greater protections. Also check out today's explanatory piece from San Jose Mercury News Washington correspondent Mike Zapler. These stories offer a model for reporters looking to bring health reform home to their own states.

Here's an excerpt from Zapler's story:

A host of medical services that insurers must pay for in California - from cancer screenings to diabetes treatment to two-day hospital stays for delivering mothers - could be weakened or lost if the health care measures pending in Congress become law.

Currently, any health insurer selling policies in California must comply with the state's extensive consumer protections. The reform measures would allow insurance firms to sell policies across state lines if certain conditions were met, bypassing California's rules in favor of the requirements in the state where the policy is issued.

The result, critics warn, would be a "race to the bottom," in which insurance companies set up shop in states with the weakest consumer rights and skirt California's lengthy list of mandated health care services.

Are the health insurance consumer protections in your state more or less stringent than the proposed federal health reform bills? How would you find out? Here are some resources:

1. Trudy Lieberman, who directs the health and medical reporting program in the graduate school of journalism at City University of New York, offers in the Columbia Journalism Review a helpful laundry list of the various consumer protections that can be compared between state laws and proposed federal health reforms. 

2. The Kaiser Family Foundation's State Health Facts site offers state-by-state overviews of consumer health insurance protections, including mandated benefits for mental health and maternity coverage.

3. The Council for Affordable Health Insurance has a 2009 report on state-mandated insurance benefits. Some might be undercut by federal health reforms.

4. A handy interactive map from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners leads you to the web page for your state's insurance department.

Share your thoughts in the comments below, and don't forget to check out our recently updated ideas for covering the health reform debate in your community here. You need to be a registered member of Center for Health Journalism Digital to leave a comment, so if you haven't joined yet, click here. It's easy, quick and free. You can follow us on Twitter, too, @ReportingHealth.