Tobacco Use—Not Promiscuity or Drug Abuse—Will Be Only Vice Legally Punishable by Higher Insurance Premiums Under Senate Health Care Bill

Wednesday, July 15, 2009
By Terence P. Jeffrey, Editor-in-Chief


Accompanied by congressmen and medical professionals, President Obama talks about health care reform, July 15, 2009, in the Rose Garden of the White House. Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., acting chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, is second from left. (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds)(CNSNews.com)

- Under the terms of the health-care reform bill approved by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, the legal use of tobacco products is the only vice for which insurance companies will be able to charge their customers higher premiums.

The summary of the bill published by the committee specifically states that premiums may be varied to account for tobacco use, but any other use of a person’s record of insurance claims, health status or medical history will be forbidden.

In other words, a person could have been admitted to hospitals three times for heroin overdoses, or been pregnant five times out of wedlock, or been treated for venereal diseases at least once per year for the past five years, but none of these factors could be used to charge that person a higher insurance premium.

If they smoked a pipe it would be a different story—depending, of course, on what was in the pipe. They could be charged a higher premium if it was tobacco—but apparently not if it was marijuana, hashish or crack cocaine.

“Health status underwriting and the imposition of pre-existing condition exclusions are prohibited in all individual and group employer markets,â€