Does Your Weight Affect Your Insurance Options?

Posted in Health Insurance

July 29th, 2010

Being overweight in this society has been an ongoing issue for several decades. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), obesity in the United States has increased dramatically over the past 20 years. For instance, in 1988, there were no states that had a prevalence of obesity greater than 15 percent in the country. By 2008, only one state (Colorado) had a less than 20 percent prevalence of obesity.

The massive increase in obesity has had a significant impact on health as it is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease, certain types of cancer and type 2 diabetes. Since being overweight or obese plays such a significant role in whether a person could get sick, easily injured or die, insurance companies have made weight a determining factor in what a person will be charged for coverage, or even if they’ll be declined coverage completely.

If you or a family member or obese or overweight, you should know your weight could affect your insurance rates. Also, it’s good to find out if there are options for insurance for overweight people.

Weight and Your Insurance

Being overweight or obese is known to have an effect on your health insurance options. However, many don’t know that it also has an effect on your life insurance options as well. As previously mentioned, the correlation between your weight and illness creates risk factors that insurance companies must consider when determining how much to charge for coverage (or even whether or not to accept you) because obesity could increase their likelihood of having to pay a claim in the future.

According to Med Plan Access, there is an undeniable correlation between weight and insurance. They even mapped out a chart that shows the effects your weight could have on your coverage.

For instance, according to the chart, a woman who is 5’5” and weighs between 175 and 235 pounds would probbly have to pay more for their health insurance coverage than a woman with a healthier height/weight combination. If the same person were to weigh over 235 pounds, they could be denied coverage, period. For a man at 5’10” weighing between 215 and 281 pounds, health coverage costs could also increase. Coverage would likely be denied if he weighed over 281 pounds.

With such a large portion of the population being overweight or obese, many people may find themselves with heftier health bills.

Unfortunately, the same is true with life insurance coverage. A life insurance health exam is required in most instances to obtain coverage. This is in order to gauge your overall health and level of risk you present for premature death – and a premature payout for the insurance company.

It’s for this reason that obtaining life insurance for overweight people is often difficult as well, unless the applicant is able to find coverage that doesn’t examine these details.

How to Combat Weight Affecting Your Insurance

Unfortunately, it is up to the insurance company to determine how much they want to charge for your insurance coverage or if they will take you on at all. However, if you fall into a weight category that could negatively affect your insurance options, there are routes you could take to stay covered:

• Lose weight: Probably one of the healthiest options would be to lose weight. Not only would you feel better, but you could become eligible for cheaper coverage options. Getting healthy is a great thing and a goal everyone should strive for in their lifetime, so why not improve you life and find affordable health insurance at the same time?
• Find lenient coverage options: There are companies that offer lenient coverage options for both health and life insurance. Coverage sometimes known as overweight health insurance offers affordable options for those who are considered clinically overweight or obese. There are also no health exams required orf those whose health may not permit them to be approved for coverage in their current condition.
• Wait for health care reform: Though health care reform laws successfully passed and health insurance changes are on the way, companies still have the right to deny coverage to anyone with a preexisting condition for some time. If you know that you won’t be able to lose a significant amount of weight soon, you could consider low-income health insurance options to help you get care while waiting out reform.

The fact is, excessive weight could have an adverse effect on both your health and insurance. The best option is to get down to a healthy weight rather sooner than later. In the meantime, be sure you you understand the options that exist so you can get insured even when weight affects your insurance options.