COBRA Health Insurance, Meanest Screw Up

COBRA, the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act: how people need it and resent it at the same time. Due to this year's worldwide recession, a lot of people get laid off from their jobs. And as stipulated in the COBRA (which was a law passed by the late President Ronald Reagan, the government is said to help its people get the chance of buying medical insurance from their past employers}. This COBRA health benefit is meant to provide for the medical needs of poor people who cannot meet the age requirements for Medicare. However, this reminds them of times wherein they feel that they are being tagged of using it like a food stamp.

Former employees, retirees along with their dependents are entitled to temporarily continue paying their COBRA health benefit as a group. This group health insurance of COBRA though is much more expensive than the one paid by employed personnel. This is because, employers are required to pay a part of the premiums of their employees.

COBRA provides medical assistance for their beneficiaries which includes; ??hospital care (inpatient or outpatient), physician care, surgical and other major medical benefits, also prescription drugs and other medical cares such as those of dental and optical clinics. Receiving all these benefits is a definite relief for a lot of families. Yet, it seemed to have deprived these people of their chance to live comfortably.

We've known a harmoniously living couple; the husband is closing in on 70, and was laid off from a job as a shelf stocker quite a while ago; he receives his Social Security check, a couple thousand dollars, and is more or less okay. His wife is about seven years younger than him; she was working as a supervisor at a bookstore until recently, and had coverage; but the bookstore chain had to downsize, and she was laid off permanently. Losing her paychecks, she wouldn't be able to buy her costly medicines if it wasn't for her application in the COBRA. It cost her just a couple of hundred dollars every month while she was still working. However, it is likely to change because of President Obama's business stimulus package at which point allows unemployed and laid-off citizens to claim their COBRA medical insurance for a span of only nine months. The old lady will now then have to surrender half of her paychecks by March, just to buy the coverage which in turn leaves her with about $1000 from her unemployment benefits. They wonder what they're going to live on now.