The flu season is upon us. That time of year when the sounds of people sneezing and coughing are rampant in the classrooms. With this in mind, there are thousands of students in community colleges who don’t have some kind of medical coverage. So what are these students, who don’t have medical insurance, supposed to do if they get sick or injured?
The Community College League of California is now offering students affordable health insurance through the health center on campus. A good idea considering medical care in the U.S. is one of the fastest growing expenses in the country and is- already higher in the U.S. then anywhere else in the world.
Medical bills can be very costly with a visit to the Emergency Room costing up to $500 and the charge of room and board at the hospital including the doctor’s fees rounding $2,500.
The problem is that sometimes students don’t even know whether they have health insurance or not and if they do what kind of coverage it is. Many students are covered under their parent’s medical plan. However, students 23 years of age and older may no longer be eligible to be covered under their parent’s insurance plans. This leaves the students with the burden of having to pay for lofty bills on top of the already expensive fees for education.
Health insurance will be available for both domestic and international students. Domestic students must be taking a minimum of 6 units and all-suitable international students will be eligible to get health insurance.
The health insurance plans for domestic students start at $646, which is a reasonable price considering that the plan will pay partly for visits to the physician, prescription drugs, and room and board at the hospital, a discount vision plan, and more. With the recent budget increases people don’t really need to be paying more than they should for anything else and we all need to be saving as much money as we can.
Most students who attend a community college might not even think twice about acquiring medical insurance because they’re still relatively healthy, but now is the time to get insurance because you never know what could happen in the long run and it’s always good to be prepared just in case something bad were to happen.
Having health insurance could mean the difference between how good or how bad you do in school. If you were sick then you would be unable to do a satisfactory job in classes, since you would probably not make it to class often enough. The more you go to class, the chance of you improving your grade occurs.