Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 2, 1994 TAG: 9402020201
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGARET EDDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
While a floor vote in the House and approval by the Senate are pending, the insurers' decision to compromise signaled the successful end of a passionate three-year fight by breast cancer victims and their families.
If approved as expected, the bill will require insurers to offer coverage of bone-marrow transplants and stem-cell transplants to individuals who do not already have breast cancer, beginning Jan. 1, 1995.
Although companies offering group policies do not have to subscribe to the coverage for their employees, the mandate should eventually make the expensive therapies available to tens of thousands of women for about $5 a month, advocates say. Fewer than 300 are expected to need the treatment each year.
"It's a good day for every woman in Virginia," said Del. David Brickley, D-Woodbridge, a backer of the bill, after the voice vote by the House Committee on Insurance, Corporations and Banking.
"It's a beautiful compromise. We're extremely pleased," said Nancy Davenport-Ennis, a Hampton breast-cancer surviver and founder of the grass-roots task force that led the lobbying effort.
Insurance lobbyists were more subdued, however, insisting that the industry was moving toward offering the coverage on its own. Asked if the legislation is a landmark step, Joan Gardner, vice president of government affairs for Blue Cross/Blue Shield, said, "I don't know."
Virginia's largest health insurer has "been dealing with this for three years, and I think we've been responsible," Gardner said. "It's no change from what we have out in the market."
Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Virginia already offers the coverage as a rider to group policies, and has petitioned the State Corporation Commission for permission to offer it to individuals.
Still, advocates said the bill represents significant progress. Not all insurers have followed Blue Cross' lead, particularly in insuring individuals.
A few years ago, transplants cost up to $200,000, a factor in the insurers' original opposition. Costs have dropped to an estimated $64,000 to $73,000.
"Insurance companies were losing lawsuits in state after state," Brickley said. "They realized that now is the time to move forward."
Advocates cautioned that it will be up to women to insist that their employers subscribe to the transplant coverage. The legislation "really puts this in the hands of corporations," said Robert Watters, a lobbyist representing the Task Force for Breast Cancer Insurance Reform. "Women have got to lobby their employers" to insist on coverage.
Keywords:
G.A. 1994
by CNB