My fellow Americans, how the hell are teeth not covered by medical plans? Why do I have to get a completely different coverage specifically for my teeth? And who can I yell at?
Thanks in advance
In: Other
There’s an insurance reason, and it is because loss patterns are completely different.
Most people, they don’t use their dental insurance much. You get a check up, a couple cleanings, and maybe a filling here and there. 99% of the time, this adds up to like a thousand dollars in a year, if that. And even if you need “major” dental work, it’s only a few thousand more. Rarely does a dental bill become something seriously high.
Regular medical insurance costs are much different, because they *quickly* become expensive. Yes the usual is just a check up, but people semi frequently break a bone and need surgery, or have another problem that can cost a lot of money. They can easily reach 6 figures.
So it makes sense to keep dental (and vision) insurance separate from your medical, because then you actually see benefits for your dental care. Adding the dental costs of maybe $600 a person per year just means so little in major medical insurance among the 6 and 7 figure bills they see, that they wouldn’t make sweeping changes to plans to accommodate dental care now being part of it.
So if they were to be combined, the only change for you would as a person would be that now you have to pay a higher price to go to the dentist every year, because it would be under your insurance deductible. Keeping it separate, at least you have the option to not pay the $10-20 a month for dental insurance.
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