Aisle Nine: Cheap Healthcare?
Wal-Mart is an American business trend setter, so news about their new low premium, high deductible healthcare plan has been making waves. As reported in the Wall Street Journal today, the Value Plan has a monthly premium as low as $11, a high deductible of $1,000, and three doctor visits and generic drug prescriptions a year. Critics contend the plan cuts corporate costs for healthcare benefits and discourages unhealthy employee prospects.
CDH and HSA plans are still in the infancy of adoption; time will tell how popular they will become. There is no doubt employers will offer such plans to stem the tide of rising premiums. Young and healthy consumers will clearly benefit; the rest are likely to be ill-served by high deductible plans. This creates a built-in limit to the viability of such offerings. But whatever the case, options that lower costs should be embraced.
Tags: CDH, Consumer+Directed+Healthcare, Health+Savings+Account, Healthcare+PR, HSA, Managed+Care, Online+PR, Wal-Mart
Posted by Shawn Whalen on September 28, 2006 at 12:39 PM
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Newt just did a post similar to this on transformation of the Healthcare system at
http://consumerhealthworld.com/
Posted by: Andrew - Transmarx | October 4, 2006 9:28 AM