A new federal law will allow college students with serious health conditions to take a one-year medical leave without losing their health insurance. Before the law went into effect on Oct. 9, college students had to be enrolled in classes full time to retain coverage under their parents' health care plan.
AnnMarie and Glen Morse New Hampshire residents led the campaign for the legislation, which is named after their daughter, Michelle Morse. Michelle contracted colon cancer in 2003 while studying to become a teacher at Plymouth State University. Although Michelle's doctors had recommended that she enroll as a part-time student while receiving biweekly chemotherapy treatments, she chose to take courses full time so that she would be covered under her parents' health insurance, according to her mother.
Had Michelle lightened her course load, she would have lost her health benefits and her family would have had to pay for COBRA coverage. COBRA allows people who lose their health insurance to extend their coverage for a short period of time. The family would have had to pay a $1,100 monthly premium for Michelle to receive COBRA coverage, in addition to a co-pay.
"The co-pays would cost a second mortgage on a house we didn't have," AnnMarie Morse said in an interview with The Dartmouth.
Morse said her efforts to obtain an exception to her insurance company's full-time student requirement were unsuccessful. Representatives from the New Hampshire Insurance Department, a state department that regulates insurance providers, told her the only solution was to push for legislation requiring such exemptions.
The Morses launched a campaign in 2004 to alter the New Hampshire Employment Retirement Income Security Act to allow students age 18 or older to take up to a one-year medical leave of absence from college and retain their health insurance coverage. Michelle's Law was passed by the state legislature and signed into law by Gov. John Lynch, D-N.H., on June 22, 2006.
Michelle Morse died in November 2005, a month shy of her 23rd birthday.
AnnMarie Morse then worked to pass the law on a federal level. She contacted Rep. Paul Hodes '72, D-N.H., former Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H., and Sen Judd Gregg, R-N.H., who introduced the bill in Congress.
The federal bill passed unanimously in both houses. Former President George W. Bush signed the bill into law on Oct. 9, 2008, to go into effect the following year.
"Paul Hodes gave a lot of the credit to AnnMarie Morse, who spent hours upon hours talking to legislators, talking to senators, talking to members of Congress, anyone who would listen. She was a real hero of this legislation," Hodes spokesman Mark Bergman said.
Morse said that the victory was bittersweet.
"I kept saying, Thank you, thank you, thank you,' but there wasn't a feeling of exhilaration," Morse said. "It's sweet that no one will walk in our shoes again, that college students won't have to make the choice that Michelle made, but on the bitter side we don't have her."
College professors interviewed by The Dartmouth said that legislation like Michelle's Law highlights the current health care system's flaws.
"There have been many laws we had to create in the last few years," sociology department chair Denise Anthony said. "People keep losing their insurance. We keep having to patch that system, and it's more evidence of what's wrong."
Gilbert Welch, professor of medicine and community and family medicine at Dartmouth Medical School, said that young adults' lack of insurance is a national problem.
"One of the largest groups of uninsured are healthy people who are coming out of education," Welch said. "They haven't really started careers that provide health insurance, but they're too old to be on their parents' plan anymore."
Morse said she will continue to fight against unfair health policies.
"Michelle's law is now in place, but I'm still fighting for health care reform," Morse said. "As a mother, I saw what a cancer patient with insurance had to go through, hoops they had to jump through. What happens to these people who don't have insurance? What do they go through?"
