One of the Iowans who doesn’t think they’ll be able to afford health insurance next year went to a statehouse event to ask legislators for help — and some answers.
Fifty-seven-year-old Bill Zook of Ankeny earns too much to qualify for subsidies to buy insurance on the individual market.
Medica is the only insurance company left that will sell 2018 policies to the 22-thousand Iowans who must buy on the individual market. Zook says Medica will charge him 24-hundred a month, with a deductible of nearly 14-thousand dollars. Adding on co-payments for office visits, Zook estimates he’d spend nearly 40-thousand dollars next year if he buys a Medica policy.
Zook, who says he has voted Republican, had hoped President Trump’s recent executive order allowing companies to sell insurance across state lines might help. But Zook can’t find any companies willing to sell him a policy.
Zook retired at the age of 55 after working in the retail industry. Six months after he retired, Zook’s former employer cancelled health insurance benefits for all retirees. Zook says he was told by his former company that policies sold on the “ObamaCare” exchange would be cheaper, but he says the Wellmark policies he bought were not cheap. Wellmark is not selling individual policies for 2018.
