Charging the Unhealthy More For Insurance

Joe The Dragon sends us a BusinessWeek story, run on Yahoo, about Clarian Health and the new thing they are trying with health insurance coverage for their employees. They are charging unhealthy people more. The article goes into some depth about whether this is a good idea and whether the practice might spread. "In late June, the Indianapolis-based hospital system announced that starting in 2009, it will fine employees $10 per paycheck if their body mass index (BMI, a ratio of height to weight that measures body fat) is over 30. If their cholesterol, blood pressure, and glucose levels are too high, they'll be charged $5 for each standard they don't meet. Ditto if they smoke: Starting next year, they'll be charged another $5 in each check."

Comments

Re:Driving optional, living less so

[Jason Earl]

My guess is that if you had some sort of congenital disease (and who knows, maybe you do) you would still rather be born than not. That's the funny thing about life. You might thing someone else's life isn't worth living, but they probably don't agree.

BMI is irrelevant

[Gr8Apes]

BMI is a completely useless "index". It's similar to comparing a car's safety via a mass/gas mileage rating.