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New Report Proves Age Rating an Excuse for Excessive Premiums

AARP Executive Vice President John Rother issued this statement following the release of today’s Urban Institute report on health insurance age-rating:

  “Age-rating is just a wonky way to describe how insurance companies use age as an excuse to charge older Americans excessive premiums.  Today’s report by the Urban Institute shows that denying older Americans affordable coverage is not only unfair, it could also increase the cost of health reform if it is not strictly limited.

  “We should be working toward a fair system where all Americans can afford coverage to get and stay healthy.  AARP has been fighting for years to abolish age-rating entirely.  This year we have an opportunity to make great progress towards that goal with health care reform that tightly limits age-rating, which today can force older Americans to pay much higher rates just because of their age.

“Today’s report shows that tighter age-rating limits actually reduce the cost of reform by billions of dollars while providing affordable coverage options to millions who would remain uninsured under wider limits.

  “AARP will continue our fight to make quality health care affordable to every American, regardless of age.”

  For more information about AARP’s fight to limit health insurance age-rating, please visit www.aarp.org/getthefacts.