Health Insurance

WASHINGTON -- Nearly one-third of the 35 million Americans without health insurance would buy coverage if they could deduct the costs from their federal taxes, according to a study released yesterday. The study says 9.8 million Americans -- mostly self-employed or small business workers -- would purchase health insurance if federal tax policy were changed to allow them to deduct the entire amount of the costs, said the non-partisan group, Health Care Solutions for America. At the same time, the study found that those who lack health insurance are mostly low-income families and minorities, who are much less likely to work for employers who provide health insurance.

Health Insurance Counseling and Advocacy Program counselors are available to seniors living in the Savage-Laurel area.Counselors will be available from 10 a.m. to noon the third Monday of each month at Southeastern Health Center, 9525 Durness Lane, Laurel.Schedule an appointment by calling Jeanette Krapcho at (410) 313-7212.POLICE LOG* Jessup: 8300 block of Bristol Court: A burglar broke the front window of Trimex Inc. with a rock and stole lap-top computers and a fax printer Thursday morning, police said.

Three people charged with defrauding 43,000 health insurance customers of millions of dollars in premiums have pleaded guilty in Miami. They participated in one of the largest health insurance scams prosecuted by the federal government in recent years, law-enforcement officials said.The three were indicted last month on federal charges of cheating workers out of $29 million in premiums.They are a former executive and two business associates of International Forum of Florida Health Benefit Trust, a company in class known as Multiple Employee Welfare Arrangements, or MEWAs.

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Recently, we learned that poverty in the United States has been declining of late, but now we're told that the number of Americans without health insurance has risen to 44.3 million -- 833,000 more than a year ago and 4.5 million more than when President Clinton took office in 1993.Even in households with annual incomes of at least $50,000, the number of people without insurance increased last year, to 12.2 million.In the midst of the longest sustained economic boom in history, with the lowest unemployment rate in 30 years, how is it possible that the ranks of the uninsured keep swelling?

ANNAPOLIS -- To the applause of a roomful of lobbyists and the committee members themselves, a House committee yesterday passed a bill aimed at making health insurance more affordable as a first step toward solving the problem of Maryland's uninsured population.The bill would allow small businesses to offer their employees a relatively inexpensive health insurance policy, one that does not include many of the 32 benefits state law currently mandates that all employers offer if they offer any insurance at all.The bill, part of a package of health insurance reforms recommended by a gubernatorial commission, faces a tough fight on the House floor and in the Senate.

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama and his congressional allies took a modest step toward reshaping the nation's health care system yesterday as the Senate passed legislation to expand health insurance for children. But rather than building momentum for the sweeping health care reform that Obama has promised, the victory on Capitol Hill - a largely party-line 66-32 vote - marked a rocky start for what many hope will be the biggest reform campaign in a generation. "To start out the year on this note does not bode well for future health care discussions, including health reform," Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, a Utah Republican, warned colleagues as the Senate debated the children's health insurance bill, which would enlarge the current program for helping children of the so-called working poor.

WASHINGTON -- Administration officials said yesterday that they are considering asking employers to pay a percentage of their payrolls in premiums to help finance health care for all Americans. To raise more money, employees would have to pay a portion of their earnings.Employers would pay the premium to a regional health insurance purchasing group, which would buy coverage for hundreds of thousands or millions of people. The "payroll premium" would apply to all companies that take part in the purchasing pool, including many small businesses that do not now provide health benefits to their workers.

WASHINGTON -- New hope for Senate agreement on health care reform was offered yesterday by a bipartisan group of moderates who are developing a plan to require individuals, rather than employers, to buy insurance.The group, led by Sen. John H. Chafee, a Rhode Island Republican, plans to unveil its compromise proposal tomorrow before the Senate Finance Committee. Other legislators on the deadlocked panel hope that the Chafee plan will provide a basis for formal committee action beginning next week.

In an effort to help more Marylanders obtain health insurance, a state task force recommended yesterday several steps to make individual policies more affordable, easier to obtain and harder to cancel.The recommendations would affect Marylanders who can't obtain insurance through employers or other groups.About 300,000 people now hold individual policies, and another 600,000 have no insurance. Many of them might benefit from the recommendations.If the recommendations are followed by the General Assembly, insurers would be required to offer a comprehensive benefits package identical to the one the state has directed insurers to offer to small businesses and groups.

BEFORE too long, college seniors will be getting diplomas -- and one of their first financial lessons in the real world: As new graduates, they face being dropped from parents' health insurance. Policies differ, but young adults typically lose their parents' coverage at age 19, or if they go to college, at 22 or 23. So just as they are intent on a job hunt or moving off campus, they have the added hurdle of finding insurance. Many don't bother. About one in four young adults, age 18 to 24, are without health insurance, making them the least likely of any age group to have medical coverage, according to the 2000 U.S. Census.