- They suggest that in some wacky instances, individual insurance is actually cheaper than a group policy. There are certainly some problems with individual insurance, but it's almost always cheaper than group.
- The article implies that once you lose your job and exhaust COBRA, you should start looking at individual policies. If you're worried about losing your job (and especially if you have already lost it), you need individual insurance before you lose the option of employer coverage. It's incredibly irresponsible to wait to get laid off before looking into more reliable coverage (hence the word "insurance").
- This is the worst one. The say that a state insurance commissioner can tell you "if your state has a 'high risk' pool." The federal government requires every state to provide health insurance options for people that can't get it elsewhere. In many states you have to be HIPAA eligible to qualify, but every single state in this country has risk pool for people that can't get individual insurance.
These problems might not seem that major, but it's frustrating how the media seems to assume that you should sit on your group coverage and then exhaust COBRA just because their are no other options.
If you think you'll lose your job, group insurance is the worst option available, not the best.
