Dear Editor:
The people designing health insurance plans have lost touch with a basic fact: For many Vermonters, healthcare is a luxury they can’t afford.
I was glad to see that Blue Cross Blue Shield canceled its proposed “Vermont Basic” health plans. The debate over this proposal showed just how completely disconnected the people designing these plans and our healthcare system have become from the lives of ordinary Vermonters.
To call a plan with an $11,800 deductible before the insurance would bother to kick in an “affordable option” exists only in a policy fantasy bubble. An individual or a family struggling to pay rent, buy groceries and keep up with utility bills in our very high-cost, low-wage society doesn’t suddenly gain access to healthcare just because their monthly premium might drop by a few dollars. They simply trade one unaffordable bill for another.