CBS News
How to get long-term care insurance with pre-existing conditions
Getty Images
Aging Americans face hefty healthcare costs. In fact, the typical nursing room costs seniors $104,000 annually — and that’s for a shared room. Even in-home services can come with huge price tags, ranging from $5,720 to $6,292 per month, according to data from Genworth.
Long-term care insurance policies can be a solution for covering these costs. The key is getting a policy before your health turns south, as this can make it difficult to qualify or make your premiums significantly more expensive.
“Long-term care insurance policies require medical underwriting, where insurance companies evaluate your health history and current medical condition,” says Susana Zinn, an independent life insurance agent in Miami Beach, Fla. “Pre-existing conditions will surely affect eligibility for coverage.”
Still, it’s not impossible. Are you considering getting long-term care insurance coverage but already have a pre-existing condition or two? Here’s what experts say to do.
Compare your long-term care insurance options online now.
How to get long-term care insurance with pre-existing conditions
If you want to purchase a long-term care insurance policy with pre-existing conditions, it may help to do the following:
Understand what would qualify as a pre-existing condition
The first step is to understand what medical conditions might — and might not — impact your long-term care insurance options.
“High blood pressure — controlled — is probably not a big deal for any type of long-term care policy,” says Mike Raines, owner of Raines Insurance Group. “But a history of cancer, dementia, or diabetes can be difficult to get approved for with traditional long-term care policies.”
According to Mark Baron, owner of Baron Long-term Care Planning, taking anti-anxiety or cholesterol medications is likely fine, too. You should also consider how your conditions combine together, Baron says.
“Long-term care insurance is available to those with many pre-existing conditions, but it depends on what the condition is,” Baron says. “Some conditions that would normally be insurable may not be when combined with another insurable condition. These are called comorbid conditions.”
This might include having diabetes and heart disease simultaneously or having a history of COVID-19 and some sort of respiratory condition.
“Then there are some issues that are an outright decline by all companies,” Baron says. “If someone has been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, Alzheimer’s, dementia, Parkinson’s, AIDS, and several other medical issues, they can’t buy long-term care insurance.”
Find out what your best long-term care insurance choices are online now.
Compare insurers
Insurers vary on what they consider pre-existing conditions — and how they treat them — so if you have any sort of pre-existing issue, you’ll want to shop around before deciding who to apply with.
“Different insurers have varying underwriting criteria,” Zinn says. “Look for insurers who specialize in high-risk applicants or have more lenient policies on pre-existing conditions.”
According to Baron, insurers also have different approaches to long-term care insurance pricing when it comes to pre-existing conditions. While some price-based on your health and the conditions and medications you have, others use a pass-fail system, with a single price for all those who “pass.” These approaches can result in two very different premiums, depending on your conditions.
For this reason, you may want to use an independent insurance agent when shopping around for your policy.
“An experienced broker can guide you to insurers more likely to accept applicants with pre-existing conditions and help navigate the underwriting process,” Zinn says.
Look to your employer
In addition to comparing long-term care insurance companies and talking to an independent agent, you should also work with your employer’s human resources department if you’re still working.
“Some employers or organizations offer group long-term care insurance,” Zinn says. “These may have less stringent underwriting or guaranteed acceptance.”
Guaranteed acceptance policies don’t require medical underwriting or any exams. Even applicants with pre-existing conditions are approved automatically.
If you are approved
If you are approved for a long-term care insurance policy, set your expectations. For one, you might get a higher premium than you’d like.
“It’s likely that premiums will be higher for those with pre-existing conditions,” Zinn says. “The additional risk associated with these conditions leads insurers to increase premiums to cover potential future claims.”
You also might face waiting periods for coverage of certain conditions or treatments. These typically last anywhere from six months to two years, depending on this issue.
The bottom line
If you want an affordable long-term care insurance policy, the best option is to apply early — at a young age and before you start having health issues. And if you’re worried you won’t qualify or get a premium you can afford, explore other options. Many life insurance policies offer long-term care benefits these days, and there are also annuities you can use in a similar fashion.
These can be easier to qualify for than long-term care policies and are often more affordable. “If the client dies healthy, there will also be a death benefit lump-sum of money that is income-tax-free for the beneficiaries,” Zinn says.
Roger Carstens, the Biden administration’s top official for freeing Americans held overseas, on Friday arrived in Damascus, Syria, for a high-risk mission: making the first known face-to-face contact with the caretaker government and asking for help finding missing American journalist Austin Tice.
Tice was kidnapped in Syria 12 years ago during the civil war and brutal reign of now-deposed Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. For years, U.S. officials have said they do not know with certainty whether Tice is still alive, where he is being held or by whom.
The State Department’s top diplomat for the Middle East, Barbara Leaf, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, accompanied Carstens to Damascus as a gesture of broader outreach to Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, known as HTS, the rebel group that recently overthrew Assad’s regime and is emerging as a leading power.
Near East Senior Adviser Daniel Rubinstein was also with the delegation. They are the first American diplomats to visit Damascus in over a decade, according to a State Department spokesperson.
They plan to meet with HTS representatives to discuss transition principles endorsed by the U.S. and regional partners in Aqaba, Jordan, the spokesperson said. Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled to Aqaba last week to meet with Middle East leaders and discuss the situation in Syria.
While finding and freeing Tice and other American citizens who disappeared under the Assad regime is the ultimate goal, U.S. officials are downplaying expectations of a breakthrough on this trip. Multiple sources told CBS News that Carstens and Leaf’s intent is to convey U.S. interests to senior HTS leaders, and learn anything they can about Tice.
Rubinstein will lead the U.S. diplomacy in Syria, engaging directly with the Syrian people and key parties in Syria, the State Department spokesperson added.
Diplomatic outreach to HTS comes in a volatile, war-torn region at an uncertain moment. Two sources even compared the potential danger to the expeditionary diplomacy practiced by the late U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, who led outreach to rebels in Benghazi, Libya, in 2012 and was killed in a terrorist attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound and intelligence post.
U.S. special operations forces known as JSOC provided security for the delegation as they traveled by vehicle across the Jordanian border and on the road to Damascus. The convoy was given assurances by HTS that it would be granted safe passage while in Syria, but there remains a threat of attacks by other terrorist groups, including ISIS.
CBS News withheld publication of this story for security concerns at the State Department’s request.
Sending high-level American diplomats to Damascus represents a significant step in reopening U.S.-Syria relations following the fall of the Assad regime less than two weeks ago. Operations at the U.S. embassy in Damascus have been suspended since 2012, shortly after the Assad regime brutally repressed an uprising that became a 14-year civil war and spawned 13 million Syrians to flee the country in one of the largest humanitarian disasters in the world.
The U.S. formally designated HTS, which had ties to al Qaeda, as a foreign terrorist organization in 2018. Its leader, Mohammed al Jolani, was designated as a terrorist by the US in 2013 and prior to that served time in a US prison in Iraq.
Since toppling Assad, HTS has publicly signaled interest in a new more moderate trajectory. Al Jolani even shed his nom de guerre and now uses his legal name, Ahmed al-Sharaa.
U.S. sanctions on HTS linked to those terrorist designations complicate outreach somewhat, but they haven’t prevented American officials from making direct contact with HTS at the direction of President Biden. Blinken recently confirmed that U.S. officials were in touch with HTS representatives prior to Carstens and Leaf’s visit.
“We’ve heard positive statements coming from Mr. Jolani, the leader of HTS,” Blinken told Bloomberg News on Thursday. “But what everyone is focused on is what’s actually happening on the ground, what are they doing? Are they working to build a transition in Syria that brings everyone in?”
In that same interview, Blinken also seemed to dangle the possibility that the U.S. could help lift sanctions on HTS and its leader imposed by the United Nations, if HTS builds what he called an inclusive nonsectarian government and eventually holds elections. The Biden administration is not expected to lift the U.S. terrorist designation before the end of the president’s term on January 20th.
Pentagon spokesperson Pat Ryder disclosed Thursday that the U.S. currently has approximately 2,000 US troops inside of Syria as part of the mission to defeat ISIS, a far higher number than the 900 troops the Biden administration had previously acknowledged. There are at least five U.S. military bases in the north and south of the country.
The Biden administration is concerned that thousands of ISIS prisoners held at a camp known as al-Hol could be freed. It is currently guarded by the Syrian Democratic forces, Kurdish allies of the U.S. who are wary of the newly-powerful HTS. The situation on the ground is rapidly changing since Russia and Iran withdrew military support from the Assad regime, which has reset the balance of power. Turkey, which has been a sometimes problematic U.S. ally, has been a conduit to HTS and is emerging as a power broker.
A high-risk mission like this is unusual for the typically risk averse Biden administration, which has exercised consistently restrained diplomacy. Blinken approved Carstens and Leaf’s trip and relevant congressional leaders were briefed on it days ago.
“I think it’s important to have direct communication, it’s important to speak as clearly as possible, to listen, to make sure that we understand as best we can where they’re going and where they want to go,” Blinken said Thursday.
At a news conference in Moscow Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said he had not yet met with Assad, who fled to Russia when his regime fell earlier this month. Putin added that he would ask Assad about Austin Tice when they do meet.
Tice, a Marine Corps veteran, worked for multiple news organizations including CBS News.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.