How the Effects of Smoking Are Driving Up CostsMay, 2007
We're all pretty familiar with the physical effects of smoking, including cancer, emphysema, stroke, etc. However, for the first time, insurance companies are raising
health insurance rates for those who risk the dangers of smoking, opening the door for a kind of personal responsibility that hasn't yet been addressed in terms of medical coverage.
At
USA Today, a recent article explores this topic: "A growing number of private and public employers are requiring employees who use tobacco to pay higher premiums, hoping that will motivate more of them to stop smoking and lower health care costs for the companies and their workers."
And it's easy to see why employers would approve of this move. The effects of smoking cost more than just the smoker. When the Union Camp Corporation evaluated the health costs of 700 of their employees in 1992, they discovered that nonsmoking employees cost the company $462 less in health care costs than smoking employees. Among 400 production employees for whom there was absenteeism data, each nonsmoker saved the company $284 of sick pay.
And, a study of 2,500 postal employees published in the American Journal of Public Health found that the absentee rate for smokers was 33% higher than for nonsmokers.
Of course, that doesn't even touch the healthcare costs, the most direct reason why health insurance rates are going up for smokers. $75.5 billion in excess medical expenditures can be directly attributed to smoking.
Overall, for every pack of cigarettes smoked, that smoker costs the nation $7.18 in medical care and lost productivity, or about $157 billion and 440,000 premature deaths each year.
In response to such costs, health insurance agencies and employers are foisting the costs of smoking back on to the smokers. The only problem is this; the costs of smoking are so high, that it's impossible to pay them. If healthcare costs are
already leading to high health insurance rates, how can smokers afford to pay for an increase?
And again, how can they not? After all, they are most likely to need medical coverage.
Facts on:
Health Insurance Rates
Did you know...
A growing number of private and public employers are requiring employees who use tobacco to pay higher premiums?
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Offering smoking cessation programs at work seems to be one healthy alternative to both the effects of smoking and the hike in health insurance rates. Others have suggested that health insurance agencies offer smoking cessation medications to incentivize smokers, alongside reductions in premiums.
In either case, saving people's lives is a pretty great perk of saving people money in health insurance premiums.
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