If you or someone you care about does not have health care coverage, it’s not too late to sign up for quality, affordable coverage: but you’ll want to act quickly. The deadline to get insurance is March 31. After that, you’ll have to wait until November to sign up.
Many of the people I’ve met have told me they were surprised at just how affordable marketplace insurance can be. Here in Tucson, for example, a 27-year-old earning $25,000 can get covered for as little as $119 per month.
Let me tell you about one of the people who has found affordable coverage. When I was in Arizona recently, I met a woman named Heather Jelonek. Heather lost her job last December. Because she has a pre-existing medical condition, she worried that coverage would be very difficult to afford. And initially, when she was buying insurance through COBRA, it was. But then she logged on to HealthCare.gov and signed up for a plan with similar benefits that cost roughly half of what she had been paying. And because of the Affordable Care Act, her new insurer cannot legally discriminate against her because she is a woman, or because she has a pre-existing condition.
Before the Affordable Care Act, hardworking families in Tucson had few real options. Even if you worked hard and took responsibility, you could still have the rug pulled out from under you if you or someone in your family got sick, had an accident or experienced another hardship. You could pay your premium dutifully every month, only to have your insurer refuse to pay for care when you needed it most because you hit an annual or lifetime cap in coverage expenses.
But here in Tucson it truly is a new day. Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, there is choice and competition. In fact, you can now choose from 115 qualified health plans. Before the Affordable Care Act, many consumers had few if any real choices.
Unlike the old system, once you enroll, nobody can take your coverage away from you just because you get sick. And your insurance company can’t charge you more just because you are a woman; being a woman is no longer a pre-existing condition.
What’s more, by law, insurance companies now have to cover health services like doctor’s visits, prescription drugs, ambulatory care and hospital stays. Preventive care like cancer and cholesterol screenings are covered with no additional money out of your pocket.
But if you don’t enroll by March 31, you won’t get this security that comes with a marketplace plan — and you can’t enroll again until this fall.
The good news is that security for you and your family is only a click or call away: You just need to sign up by March 31 if you want marketplace coverage this year.
Don’t delay, sign up today.
