Students to pay less for LUC insurance | Loyola Phoenix

by Yara Shams
yshams@luc.edu

Health insurance will soon become more affordable for students on Loyola?s student health insurance plan, according to the Bursar.

This August, the university will switch student health insurance providers from UnitedHealthcare StudentResources to Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois (BCBS), according to university Bursar John Campbell. Though plan coverage will remain essentially unchanged, the cost of the premium for the new plan will be $1,740 per year, which is $140 dollars cheaper than the current plan.
?We were looking at what is good for our students and trying to keep costs down,? said Campbell, who oversees the contracts for student health insurance. ?If we could have a reduction in health insurance costs when most insurance is going up, then that seemed like a good time to [switch to BCBS].?

Feeling that tuition and insurance fees are already too high, many students are excited about the reduction in health insurance costs.

?I think it?s great just because we?re constantly hearing about tuition is going up, so it?s nice to hear that something is going down,? said junior Becky Triyba, a 21-year-old biology major.

The BCBS plan will cover $5,000 of prescription drug costs per year, more than the UnitedHealthcare plan, which covered $3,000 for each insured student. The maximum amount the insurance will pay while the student is insured will also increase from $500,000 to an unlimited amount as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, health care reform legislation signed by President Barack Obama in 2010.

?I can?t see any downside for the students, which is nice,? Campbell said.

?It?s a win for the students, it?s a win for the university and it?s a win for Blue Cross Blue Shield, who wants to get back into the college healthcare plans,? Campbell said.

Campbell stated that he believes another major reason for the switch is that BCBS already has a strong connection with Loyola Hospital.

?The other piece of this is that Blue Cross Blue Shield has a solid working relationship with Loyola Hospital.?

Campbell added that BCBS has a great reputation as an insurance provider in the Midwest.
Loyola requires that all undergraduates enrolled in 12 or more credit hours and all graduate and professional students enrolled for eight or more credit hours have individual health insurance, either from Loyola or from an outside provider.

In the 2011-2012 academic year, 2,200 total students were insured by Loyola?s plan under UnitedHealthcare. Many opt out of Loyola?s plan because they are covered by their families? plans, which are typically more comprehensive than student health insurance plans, Campbell said. Illinois law states that students can be insured by their parents? insurance plan, if the plan covers dependents, until they are 26 years old.

A spokesperson for UnitedHealthcare said that though the company is all for making health insurance more affordable, it is disappointed with the switch.

?We have been proud of the role we?ve played in helping Loyola students stay healthy,? said Kevin Shermach, UnitedHealthcare?s director of public relations. ?We at UnitedHealthcare StudentResources are disappointed that the university has selected an alternate carrier for its student insurance plan.?

He added that UnitedHealthcare provides students insurance plans to more than more than 390,000 students at 400 colleges and universities nationwide.

Blue Cross Blue Shield could not be reached as of press time.

Posted by Bailey Dick on March 21, 2012. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

Source: http://www.loyolaphoenix.com/students-to-pay-less-for-luc-insurance

walker recall censor pipa and sopa sopa pipa wikipedia blackout kyla pratt justified season 3