Health Insurance for HIV Positive People

People infected with AIDS often face a critical issue of obtaining a health insurance. Chances are that due to intervening governing bodies, you may be granted the health coverage, but the stigma does not end there. Keeping and using that health insurance coverage can prove another major task facing many hindrances.

Insurance companies are frequently involved in activities that many deem inappropriate like discriminating against HIV infected people. Below are some points you should watch out for.

Underwriting is an integral part of any insurance company. This process is designed for assessing the credibility of any prospective policy holder. In other words, underwriting decides the rejection or acceptance of any application form. As an applicant, you may be asked for various health related information, but in California it is unlawful for any insurance company to use the blood test report for detection of antibodies, which is the probable cause of AIDS.

It is also illegal for any company to assess risk on the basis of sexual orientation. Many a times, insurance companies violate this law by denying coverage to single males, implying on notions of them being gay or belonging to a certain area, actively known for gay community.

While offering health insurance coverage, the policies are often designed to exclude any illness or injuries which have been manifested before the policies effective date. This means that if the policy holder has suffered from any illness before the date of inception of policy, than he / she cannot claim the expense of treating that illness.

In the case of HIV infected people, frequently the symptoms are detectable to the insurer because they deal with the medical reports daily and are well aware of conditions of past and future illnesses. Most of the time, suspecting that an applicant may have the HIV infection, the insurance policy is written in such a way to avoid future claims.

Apart from this, companies also use the application form for limiting their liabilities in future. Cases where a current policyholder is found HIV infected, insurer often deny the claims on the ground of furnishing insufficient information in the application form. Court has directed rules, where by a claim in such case can only be denied, if this was done deliberately on the policy holders part. An insurance company can not refute a claim, if the policy holder has omitted certain information because he himself was not aware of it.

Hubert Miles is a blogger for many websites and the webmaster of Medical Articles and Health Insurance Articles websites.