HealthyConcerns.com

My latest task: securing health benefits for my company

So, this should be interesting and infinitely bloggable.

My company is going to start offering health benefits to its employees starting, well, as soon as we can figure it all out.

And I'm the one who is tasked with researching the options and recommending our path (although I'm kinda hoping to get some help with that.)

Should be fascinating!!

So far I've met with one firm that presents all these plan options, will work on getting the underwriting done for us, will create a web portal for our employees and will handle all administrative issues around said health benefits, portal and employees.

And the really weird part: we will not pay them a dime. They are paid by the carriers.

The guy with this company basically told me that California has a law that standardizes health premium costs by age, so that no one can really offer better premiums than anyone else (for the same plan, I mean...I'm sure carriers can offer all the different kind of plans they want.) his doesn't jive exactly with another firm that's trying to sell me on the savings I'll get going with them because they consolidate all their clients' employees and create a bigger group.

Hmmmm. More investigation required. Stay tuned.

BlogHers Act: A community activism project...where's the healthcare?

This week BlogHer introduced a new initiative: BlogHers Act. I introduced the initiative on behalf of me, Jory and Lisa here. Here's the basic idea:

Have you ever imagined the impact if every member of BlogHer – more than 11,000 bloggers strong and growing every day -- focused our considerable brainpower, ingenuity and influence on one red-hot issue? How about if that one red-hot issue was the focus of an organized, year-long campaign to make a measurable difference that this community cares about?

Yes, some of you have. And you've emailed all three of us (sometimes more than once!) to ask BlogHer to take a leadership position in bringing the BlogHer community of powerful women together to create real change

Today, Lisa, Jory and I are very proud to say "yes." We're introducing BlogHers Act. And just like the BlogHer Conference is the conference the community built, we want BlogHers Act to take on a cause the community develops.

So today the work begins: It's up to all of us to determine, between now and the conference, what project we'll unveil and kick-off an action plan for at BlogHer '07 this July in Chicago.

BlogHers Act is an opportunity for the BlogHer community to have a collective impact on a global scale. We're going to pick a single issue, organize a year-long campaign, and blog the heck out of it.

BlogHers Act will actually be comprised of two projects to kick off, one focused on creating a Voter Manifesto for a very important target audience: the U.S. '08 presidential candidates, and one focused on a global issue that we will select as a community and take organized action around all year long.

The BlogHer '07 conference will be a flashpoint for both projects, as we each project will have a session at the conference for people to work on the projects face-to-face. In fact, we'll actually be unveiling the single global issue that was selected by the community at BlogHer '07. Will you be there?

We've asked a blogging duo who has proven capability to galvanize people to action to help us, Cooper & Emily from the BeenThere Clearinghouse Hurricane Katrina blog.

You can find details on how you can participate in Cooper & Emily's initial post, and you can find out what various BlogHer members proposed in just the first four days in their week-one wrap-up post.

I, for one, am surprised that healthcare isn't MORE prevalent in the suggestions so far. Don't get me wrong, it's definitely been mentioned and included on lists of hot issues. But I'm waiting for someone to really blow our minds and twist our hearts in two with their healthcare story. Maybe one of you, dear readers?

You have until June 15th to blog your suggestion. Details here. And then look for our survey to finalize the issue selection, launching on June 25th. Oh, and you can also leave your suggestions in a comment on any BlogHers Actpst, and it will be picked up...including this one.

So, blog out everyone: what is the single hot-button global issue you'd like to see thousands of women blogger turn their laser-like focus upon and work for real, measurable change of the next 12 months?

It's not just U.S. vs. Canada or the U.K.

When it comes to health care and coverage options, I mean.

Take a minute to read this very long story on the Daily Kos from a Singaporean woman. It chronicles her ongoing efforts to manager her endometriosis, and most importantly it chronicles the very different ways she was treated between her original and adopted homes, Singapore and the U.S.

She says something toward the end that I find most interesting:

I am not advocating that the solution to US healthcare is to go overseas. I believe Americans deserve a better system. But in the interim of waiting for this broken disaster to be fixed, there are people who may benefit from knowing that their options are NOT limited to crippling debt or ill health (or death), surgery in Mexico, or a long wait in Canada. If you need to save the life of someone you love, and you know you can't afford what it would cost in the US... consider thinking outside the box and doing some travel.

Whenever someone wants to shoot down the concept that Americans deserve better health care, more, how shall I put it, universal health care, you hear a lot of horror stories about long waits in Canada and the UK.

But as the U.S. remains the only country in the industrialized world without health care as a right, perhaps we should look at all of those other countries, not just Canada and the U.K. when considering a system that might work. We could start, apparently, with Singapore.