In May 2009, NPAF released a report entitled, "Addressing the Needs of High Cost Individuals: A Proposal for Catastrophic Insurance," in order to highlight the need to assist patients with catastrophic health care costs.

NPAF encourages Members of Congress to address this issue in comprehensive health care reform this year.  The report provides an overview of our current system and the role of health insurance.  Also included are two policy recommendations to improve access to affordable health insurance for individuals with catastrophic health care costs. 

The recommendations include (1) capping out-of-pocket health care expenses at no more than $5,000 for individuals and $10,000 for families (inclusive of all healthcare expenses, including premiums, copays, coinsurance, prescription drugs, etc) and (2) providing "back end" subsidies to reduce costs to consumers (direct subsidies would be provided to insurance companies when enrollees annual expenditures reach some predetermined catastrophic level, e.g. $100,000). 

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