Representative Levy,

I urge you to vote against the tremendously misguided bill (HB10-1021) which will require that insurance policies cover maternity and contraception.  There is no reason that people who will never have kids or never have more kids (like me and my wife) should have to pay for insurance which covers very expensive health care that we’ll never need.

If people want coverage for maternity, they can choose a policy which covers it…as we did before we had children.

This bill will increase the health insurance cost for people like me for absolutely no reason other than “feel-good” nannyism which will inevitably have negative unintended consequences.  Indeed, the most likely effect of this bill will be to increase the number of uninsured in Colorado as people are priced out of coverage.

A quote from a study about the likely effects of a maternity mandate in California:

In the case of maternity services, we estimated a 13 percent premium increase on average among the 44,000 individuals (male and female) ages 25–39 who currently purchase individual policies, because premiums are typically age related, but do not differ by gender. Based on Lewin’s estimated elasticity of demand for insurance, we predicted that a 13 percent increase in premiums among this age 25-39 group would produce a 3.4 percent increase in the uninsured – about 1,900 additional uninsured Californians, of whom about 12 percent would be eligible for Medi-Cal.

How would you feel if government forced car insurance companies to cover you for driving a Ferrari even though you knew you were never going to drive one, and that change costing you a couple thousand dollars a year?

This is truly the Nanny State at its most disgustingly intrusive.  I realize you’re generally on-board with Nanny State policies, but I hope you will find a way to oppose this costly and unnecessary legislation.

Ross Kaminsky