» Posted by Martin Weil on February 18, 2010

In statements and letters, Anthem and WellPoint have explained what the industry calls a recessionary death spiral: as unemployment and declining wages prompt healthy people to drop their insurance, the remaining risk pool becomes sicker and more expensive to insure, which in turn forces up prices and pushes more people out of the market.

From an article in the NY Times on Anthem's much criticized plan to raise rates by 39% in California.

Having just been billed $35,000 for my daughter's four hours in a San Francisco hospital OR (and yes it was covered, by Anthem no less, and yes, the hospital got much much less than they billed), I can only stand in disbelief at those who do not see that our current health care financing system is utterly broken.

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