Laura Bartz, Chapter 5, Question 1

Mental illness has always been a pretty prominent aspect of my life. Many people in my family, including myself, are currently dealing with it and I asll have a long family history of mental illness. One of my family members has had to deal with having to pay for extraordinarily expensive health insurance solely because the have depression. I always though that it was really unfair and out of pure greed for insurance companies to charge so much more for health insurance just because of having depression. But Wheelan makes the point that if they don't charge these much higher premiums because of preexisting conditions, that they could easily go bankrupt. There are so many more health risks associated with depression from obesity to osteoporosis. So, rationally it makes sense for insurance companies to charge much higher amounts for health insurance with these health issues that are often associated with depression.