Passes & Canyons Blog

How is it that bureaucrats can get away with twisting a law to the exact opposite of its intent?

In this instance I’m talking about the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), which made it illegal for insurance companies to deny coverage for customers doing things like riding motorcycles or snowmobiling. At least that’s what Congress thought it was doing. By the time the bureaucrats got done with the regulations they had specifically made it legal for insurance companies to do just that. Huh?

I’ve reported previously on efforts to fix this absurdity by passing another law that would be so explicit that no bureaucrat could possibly twist in such a perverse fashion. That legislation, called the HIPAA Recreational Injury Technical Correction Act, was working its way through Congress last year.

Unfortunately, it appears to have been significantly weakened. The Motorcycle Riders Foundation (MRF) reported that the bill currently making it way through Congress does not prohibit non-coverage of motorcycle accident injuries, it only requires that if the company is going to deny these claims it must tell the policy holders well in advance that these injuries are not covered.

To summarize the legalese, your health insurance provider can limit payment for an injury sustained on a motorcycle so long as it is spelled out to you in simple terms well in advance of you joining the plan.

In closing, the MRF release states:

Closing the loophole entirely and mandating that insurance companies must cover all injuries sustained while operating a legal motorcycle is still the ultimate goal of the MRF. HR 1253 puts Congress on record that this issue needs attention and is willing to work on it. The MRF will continue to keep you updated on this important matter.

Clearly we all need to support the MRF and other motorcycle organizations in continuing to fight this fight. But how obscene is it that we won this battle back in ’96, only to have that victory snatched away by some nameless, faceless bureaucrats! Something is seriously wrong here.

Biker Quote for Today

If you don’t pursue your dream, you might as well be a vegetable.

Are you aware that your insurance company may be excluding you from coverage on accidents where you are on a motorcycle? It’s a crock of bull but it’s a reality. Some insurance companies refuse to cover injuries incurred while doing totally legal things, like riding motorcycles, even if you are in no way at fault.

How would you feel if you were sitting stopped on your bike at a stop light and some drunk who has already lost his license for driving drunk hits you. You were completely legal and he was completely illegal, and yet your injuries are not covered while his, if he has any, are. It can happen!

This is an issue raised more than 10 years ago by the American Motorcyclist Association, and it was presumably resolved by legislation passed by Congress in 1996. But a funny thing happened on the way to implementation: the federal agency charged with formulating the rules around the legislation wrote rules that directly contradicted the intent, making it absolutely legal for insurance companies to do this.

Well, Congress is trying again. The HIPAA Recreational Injury Technical Correction Act, Senate Bill 616, is now under consideration, and we all need to let our Congressional representatives know we want them to pass it.

The AMA makes it easy for you to tell your senator what you want. This page on their website lets you click to bring up a form letter addressed to your senators. We all need to press to make sure this legislation gets passed. Do it now! This is really important.