How to Get Health Insurance When HIV Positive

The purpose of health insurance is to help individuals meet most medical expenses. Health insurers have sometimes made it very difficult for HIV positive individuals to obtain health insurance or to get their insurance to cover the catastrophic costs of treatment for HIV and AIDS. However, increasing focus on the need to make health coverage universal has helped create solutions to these problems for HIV positive individuals.

Instructions

Get Health Insurance When Available Through Your Employer

• 1

  Get as much health insurance coverage as you can through your employer. Most companies with health coverage, and their insurers, do not require individuals to pass physical or medical examinations in order to gain health insurance coverage.

• 2

  Consult with an attorney if you are concerned about any disclosures that you may be asked to make by an employer or an insurer concerning your health. Such disclosure questions may come up either in the hiring process or in a health insurance application, but you should begin with the assumption that your right to privacy concerning your HIV positive status is guaranteed by law.

• 3

  Use COBRA to extend your health insurance coverage for as long as possible after you leave employment or while you are between employers.

• 4

  Seek health insurance for small business owners or self-employed individuals when you work for yourself. Business organizations and trade associations often offer insurance coverage to individual business owners and contractors, sometimes without individual underwriting.

Get Health Insurance When Available Through Your State Government

• 5

  Seek health coverage through your state government or the public or private agency through which it promotes universal health coverage if you are unable to obtain health insurance through an employer. A growing number of states including Massachusetts, California and New York have passed legislation guaranteeing health care to all.

• 6

  Ask your HIV AIDS caseworker for assistance in finding the agency that provides health insurance coverage to individuals whose employers fail to provide such coverage.

• 7

  Get disability insurance if it is available through your state and you are unable to work because of being HIV positive or having AIDS.