TAHU Update Volume No. 3 Issue No. 2 October 2001

OCTOBER MEETING

Monday, October 15, 2001
Marriott at RTP
Exit 281, Miami Blvd.
11:45 am, Luncheon Meeting

OCTOBER GUEST SPEAKER
Thomas J. White
President/CEO Greater Durham Chamber of Commerce

Tom has worked for the 1500-member Chamber of Commerce for 24 years in a variety of departmental responsibilities, including government relations, employment and training, and economic development. He began his career with the Chamber in 1977 after graduating from Duke University with a B.A. degree in English. He also holds a Master of Public Affairs degree from N.C. State University. He received the Distinguished MPA Alumnus Award in 1997, the same year he was voted the State's top economic developer by the NC Technology Development Authority. White serves as a volunteer on a number of local boards, including the Triangle United Way, the Durham Technical Community College Board of Trustees and its Foundation Board (served as chair in 1993-4), the Duke-Durham Campaign, Durham Health Partners, the Food Bank of North Carolina, LC Industries for the Blind, the Research Triangle Regional Partnership, the Triangle Urban League, the Center for Employment Training, the Black Achievers Program of the YMCA, and the Burch Avenue Family Center.

"I am proud to have served as the Board Chair of the Durham Day Care Council, the Durham Literacy Council, and the Durham United Way. Those organizations all survived my leadership, which is important because they all perform wonderful work in this fantastic community of Durham, which I am privileged to call home."

SPONSORED BY
DukeHealth Direct

President's Message:
Gene Lee, Jr., CHC

In September the Raleigh-Durham, NC chapter of the National Association of Health Underwriters welcomed with enthusiasm seventy-one members and first time visitors to the first official meeting of the new Triangle association year. Between six to seven visitors attended our meeting. Our speaker from the Duke University department of health benefits management was Jane Walbrun, She challenged the audience to think about the complexities of trying to manage and finance health care for one of the Triangle area's largest employers. Currently they have about twenty three thousand employees. Our gratitude and best wishes goes out to Jane.

The invocation delivered by past Triangle president and former NC health underwriter of the year, Bernard Obie was specially meaningful as was our regular recitation of the pledge of allegiance to the American flag. The USA's red, white and blue colors are now displayed every where in our community in homes, offices, vehicles, churches and retail stores as an expression of patriotism perhaps never seen before in our country. All this because of the attack a few weeks ago on American citizens in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, DC.

Perhaps since 1812 no act of war has occurred on American soil. I was almost convinced that my three college and high school age children would ever have a sense of what it would be like to have war come to the United States of America. In sixty minutes on the morning of September 11, 2001 everything changed for everybody in the USA. After leaving a meeting with my first customer that day, listening to "talk radio" in the car, the news I heard seemed unbelievable. Crowded around a television at the popular locally owned breakfast restaurant, dozens of Durham retirees and local workers gazed in astonishment and disbelief as the tragedy unfolded before our eyes. Some were talking on cellular phones explaining to others what they were seeing, two women cried, some just glared at each other, some left the restaurant quickly.

History books will be re-written and provide us with hundreds of details and lessons about this American catastrophe. One of the first messages to American workers may be about duty and daily responsibility to provide the very best that you are capable of doing. Now we have that message imprinted in our minds forever in the photograph of New York City firefighters raising our country's flag at "ground zero". Hundreds of firefighters lost their lives because they were advancing into harms way to save others. This was their training and their duty. I must continue to think about them ...and duty.

Vice President & GRIP/GAP/HUPAC
Sam King, CHC

I want to thank everyone who attended our first monthly meeting. I believe we've gotten off to an excellent start. We had an excellent turnout and an excellent speaker. The buffet lunch was good also.

We were able to collect $65.00 for the NCPAC. Though this wasn't our largest contribution, all dollars were appreciated. Any group wishing to sponsor the raffle prize for any of our monthly meetings should contact me at 800-337-6288.

We continue to contact and arrange for excellent speakers for the coming months. October's presentation will deal with the regional economy. November's speaker, Andy Barrett, will address the rising cost of pharmaceuticals with ideas to help curb the increasing costs in plan design. A discussion of mental health coverage is scheduled for the December meeting. An excellent presentation regarding the selling of your services in being planned for the January meeting. The February, March, and May speakers and still being secured.

Look forward to seeing you on the 15th.

Law & Legislation:
Nancy Winter

There was a September 24th article in National Underwriter, titled The Industry Will Shine In The Midst Of This Tragedy. Written from their offices, right across the Hudson River from the Trade Towers, they commented on the fact that the insurance industry will play a crucial role in the recovery. The author was responding to a few rumors that the insurance companies could wiggle out of paying claims based on act of war clauses or other small print. Thankfully, we are not so unpatriotic. The insurance industry was quick to reassure the public. Shortly after the attacks, the American Council of Life Insurers issued a statement, saying, "Our industry is financially strong and prepared to make good on our promises to policyholders." The author concludes "that life companies and agents will find in this tragic situation the opportunity to prove how valuable they are in the worst of times." NAIFA 10/3/01 Political Frontline listed out the various loss estimates in both P&C & Life, it's in the tens of billions but "... risks are spread worldwide and the industry will be able to absorb the losses."

I'm writing this article 23 days past the attack on the WC. The following was made available on NAHU.net on September 12th. By Jim Hostetler, Editor, HIU

Partial List of Insurance Orgs with Offices in WTC Picked this up from another source. Thought I'd share it.

1st Financial Funding and Investment Corp.
AIG Aviation Brokerage Inc.
Allstate Insurance Companies
American Express Financial Advisors
American Healthcare Indemnity
American Manufacturers Mutual Insurance
American Motorist Insurance Company
American Protection Insurance Company
AON Consulting
AON Re Inc.
AON Risk Services Company Inc.
Citibank N.A.
Empire HealthChoice/Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield
General Security Insurance Company
Greenwich Agency Inc. Insurance
Guy Carpenter & Company Inc.
H. Al Roth Agency Inc.
Hartford Insurance Group, including Hartford Life
Insurance Overload Systems
Insurance Services Offices Inc.
LG Insurance Company Ltd.
Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc.
National Association of Insurance Commissioners Committee on the Valuation of Securities
RLI Insurance Company
Ramon Insurance
Sakura Agency Inc.
Sandler O'Neill Partners L.P.
Scor Reinsurance Company
Seabury & Smith Inc.
Sumitomo Marine & Fire Insurance
Twin City Fire Insurance Company

Source: National Underwriter, Sept. 12, 2001 via George Sherman

P.S. For clarification, Reliastar's NYC field office was also in the WTC --- they sent out a release yesterday saying all their people were accounted for. Additionally, the NAIC's staff of 44 people in their securities valuation department was in Building #7 across the street. That's the third building that went down long after being evacuated."

I want to put this in this TAHU newsletter for several reasons (1) I don't want us to lose that fire of patriotism that flared up that first week after the attack (2) notice how the insurance industry is a huge part of our economy (3) many of our insurance colleagues were lost in this attack (4) many made it to safety before the collapse of the towers (5) via NAHUnet, we have information.

For any new members, NAHUnet is a forum of NAHU members and is an amazing source of answers and connections. One day I needed an agent in California who could sell someone an MSA product. I put out the request on NAHUnet & about 6 agents responded within 24 hours. Some other "keepers" from NAHUnet: (1) a commentary by Rick Rebel against an article written in support of the single payer universal coverage. (2) a note from Art Jetter on Sept 18th: "Jennifer and I returned Saturday from Austria. While there we were embraced by both Germans and Austrians who mourned as though they were Americans. ... Many Austrian buildings displayed huge black flags... One Austrian explained to us, "America represents freedom for all of us."

As members of NAHU, you will all have received the September 25th Washington Update which gives the latest on PBOR, Genetic testing, the prescription drug card discount program (which was stopped by a Federal district court ruling), Medicare payments for drugs, and other news from the Hill. So I'll not repeat that here. If you're not getting the Washington Updates in your e-mail and want them, let us know. Likewise, we get weekly and monthly reports from Robert Paschall and Harry Kaplan on state legislative matters. If you want these regularly forwarded to you, send me an email.

At the Federal level many of the divisive health care bills will stall due to the war, but some critical assistance measures like the tax credits and expansion of MSAs (or from the other camp, extension of Medicaid & CHIP) might yet get some attention this fall. Not so at the State level, despite the war, the NC legislature managed to pass the tax increase and is about finished with passing the Managed care PBOR - business as usual. A full listing of the other insurance bills enacted at the state level will go on our nctahu.org website.

There are a few studies of note this month. From Reuters 9/6/01: 'People who are taking newer drugs are significantly less likely to be hospitalized than those taking older drugs,' Lichtenberg told Reuters Health. 'On average, newer drugs are better than older drugs, and are worth the money,' he asserted. Overall, taking new therapies resulted in a reduction in non-drug spending of $71, which far outweighs the average $18 increase in money spent on those new drugs, the researcher reports in the September/October issue of Health Affairs".

United States Census Bureau statistics showed the number of Americans without health insurance dropped from 39.3 million in 1999 to 38.7 million in 2000. So we can throw out that 43 -45 million number we hear so often. Unfortunately, this count was during the economic & employment surges in those two years. The economic & employment troubles of 2001 will likely cause the uninsured stats to grow once again.

The National Bureau of Economic Research released a study on the estimated impact of a $1,000 refundable tax credit for health insurance. They concluded the number of uninsured is reduced by between 21 percent and 85 percent depending on the size of the deductible and actual underwriting practices. That study is available at: http://papers.nber.org/papers/W8457

The High Risk Pool project.

There is a National Association of Comprehensive Health Insurance Pools (NASCHIP), organized under Communicating for Agriculture, to promote and assist state high risk pools. This year's annual NASCHIP convention includes Janet Trautwein of NAHU as one of the featured speakers. NCAHU sent TAHU member Ken Johnson to this convention. He is there at the time of this writing absorbing all the latest and most useful information on high risk pools - preparing to bring back the best model for NC.

CHIRP

The "legislative study bills" were to be approved this week and they include the one put forth by Senator Ballantine to study high risk pools. Through NASCHIP I was introduced to the citizen most responsible for this HRP/LRC being proposed. Together, we have created a new organization called NC-CHIRP (NC Citizens for a Health Insurance Risk Pool) and a virtual office. Through NCCHIRP (www.ncchirp.org) we hope to assemble the citizens & groups who will benefit by a high risk pool and we will post on the website as much information as we can to be helpful to the Legislative Study Commission and the Department of Insurance. If things continue to fall in place as they have been, I have learned that it is possible (especially if NCAHU does a lot of the study work) to have results ready to be proposed to the legislature when the short session begins in May 2002. If you and your clients are interested in this effort, come forth and consider yourselves CHIRPers.

Nancy Winter
nancy@medsaver.org
919-493-9405

Website
Michele Gregory, MHP, RHU, REBC

What's in a name?
Have we got YOUR number!
The Fax, please, just the Fax.

One of the ways your TAHU colleagues can get in touch with you is by checking your contact information on the website - but that source is only good if the data is correct.

Please go to our website at http://www.nctahu.org

Click on the "Member List" link and review your contact information.

If you want to make any changes, click on the "Webmaster" link and send me your corrected information.

By the way, while you're there, check out the other useful features on the site -

Board - contact information for officers and board members
Join TAHU - membership information and application form
Events - a calendar of activities for TAHU members
Newsletters - copies of TAHU Update
Legislative - legislative information
Awards - award winners from 2000 - 2001
Member List - contact information for all current members
Sponsors - a list of sponsors with links to their web sites
Links - easy way to access industry websites

Michele Gregory, MHP, RHU, REBC
PARTNERS National Health Plans
Email: mgregory@partnershealth.com
Phone: 919.469.6911

Communications:
Tom Snell, CLU, ChFC, RHU, REBC

Monthly meetings are the 3rd Monday of each month starting at 11:45 am.

The next meeting will be held on October 15, 2001 at the Marriott (Research Triangle Park, NC - Exit 281, Miami Blvd.).

All members and their guests are invited to attend.

Come enjoy the fellowship, learning and following delights:

Tomato Florentine Soup
Tortellini Pasta Salad
Marinated Mushroom Salad
Chicken Forestiere
Beef Tips Bordelaise
Vegetables and Wild Rice Pilaf
Texas Millionaire Pie and Fresh Fruits

Guaranteed seating for the luncheon meeting is by reservation only.

Please fax this notice back to Tom Snell @ 919-469-6939 (local to the Raleigh/Durham area) to reserve your place. The week prior to the meeting you will receive a notice via fax. If you are not receiving the monthly fax, please contact Tom Snell @ 469-6915 or tsnell@partnershealth.com.

Attendee: ________________________________

I (will) be attending the October meeting.

I (will) (will not) bring a guest/prospective member.

Guest name: __________________________________

There is no need to fax the response back if you are not planning on attending the meeting/luncheon

Please RSVP no later than October 10th.

As the success of the Triangle Association of Health Underwriters largely depends upon the benevolence of corporate contributors, we are proud to honor the following organizations for their continued support of our many programs and activities:

Diamond Sponsors
2001-2002

Blue Cross & Blue Shield of NC

United Healthcare

Please extend your appreciation to the Triangle members representing these organizations and remember their generosity when placing coverages.

Please remember that the cost of lunch for TAHU members is $12. Guest and non-member lunches are $16.

There will be a $3 charge for lost or misplaced name badges. Please remember to turn in your badge at the conclusion of each meeting.

Triangle Association of Health Underwriters
P.O. Box 19177
Raleigh, NC 27619-9177