{"id":2156,"date":"2020-06-12T06:00:11","date_gmt":"2020-06-12T06:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/?p=2156"},"modified":"2021-09-02T20:00:07","modified_gmt":"2021-09-02T20:00:07","slug":"myth-dont-need-health-insurance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/articles\/myth-dont-need-health-insurance\/","title":{"rendered":"Fact or Fiction: I Don&#8217;t Need Health Insurance"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"512\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2705\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1.png\" alt=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1-300x150.png 300w, https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1-768x384.png 768w, https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Fact-or-Fiction-6_12-TW-1-700x350.png 700w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a>For some reason, many people feel threatened, anxious, and angry when the topic of health insurance comes up. \u00a0They rail against \u201cObamacare,\u201d the high cost of insurance premiums, and the complexities of obtaining health insurance coverage. \u00a0Some people refuse to buy health insurance, even though it is required by law, even though there are tax penalties if you fail to purchase it, and even though it is a good idea.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Leaving aside for the moment the political arguments surrounding health insurance, here are some practical reasons why <\/span><b>failure to have health insurance may harm your personal injury case<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are injured in an automobile crash and you don\u2019t have Personal Injury Protection (\u201cPIP\u201d) insurance and don\u2019t have health insurance, who will likely pay your medical bills while you recover? \u00a0<\/span><strong>Answer: \u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">YOU!<\/span><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are injured on someone else\u2019s property and don\u2019t have health insurance, who will likely pay your medical bills while you recover?<strong> \u00a0<\/strong><\/span><strong>Answer: \u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">YOU!<\/span><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are injured as a result of an uninsured motorist while you are walking or riding your bike and you don\u2019t have PIP insurance or health insurance, who will likely pay your medical bills while you recover? \u00a0<\/span><strong>Answer: \u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">YOU!<\/span><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you are injured as a result of a medical error and you don\u2019t have health insurance, who will likely pay your medical bills while you recover? \u00a0<\/span><strong>Answer: \u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">YOU!<\/span><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you don\u2019t have health or PIP insurance and <\/span><b>cannot pay for medical treatment you need<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, what happens to your case? \u00a0<\/span><strong>Answer<\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>: \u00a0<\/strong>Your case <strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">resolves for MUCH less<\/span> <\/strong>than you are entitled to because the overall value of your case is directly related to the amount of your medical bills.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you don\u2019t have health or PIP insurance and <\/span><b>cannot pay for the medical bills you already incurred<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, what happens? \u00a0<\/span><strong>Answer<\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>:<\/strong> \u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>You get sent to collection and your credit gets ruined.<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Note that these bad consequences will happen <\/span><b>even if someone else is at fault<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for your injuries! \u00a0<\/span><b>The person who is responsible for your injuries doesn\u2019t have to pay for your medical treatment until the very end of the case<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, after you have already recovered from your injuries.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In addition, if you use PIP or health insurance to pay your medical bills, you will have to use some of the money we get you for your claim to repay that insurer, but <\/span><b>we can often get a significant discount on what we pay back to that insurer<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. \u00a0Sometimes the discount is as much as 30%-40%. \u00a0Because the person who caused your injury has to pay you 100% of your medical bills at the end of the case and you only have to pay back 60%-70%, that extra money goes in YOUR pocket!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, <\/span><b>if you don\u2019t have health insurance<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, then you will have to pay 100% of the medical bill and <\/span><b>you will not realize any discount or cost savings at the end of the case<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. \u00a0In addition, if you incurred collection fees or interest, you may actually end up not being fully reimbursed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Long story short, <\/span><b>ALWAYS buy health insurance<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">!! \u00a0If you are injured, it will protect you in ways you can\u2019t even imagine. \u00a0And, since none of us can prevent every single injury or force other people to be more careful, you never know when you will need it.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center;\">If you\u2019re in need of a lawyer, call Nelson Boyd\u00a0at 206-971-7601.<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":2705,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[114,34,317,26,38,118,98,122,318],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2156"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3127,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156\/revisions\/3127"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}