Anthem Blue Cross, California's largest for-profit health insurer, is raising premiums for individual insurance policies by 30-39 percent on March 1, according to a report by the Los Angeles Times.
Individual policies, which already tend to be more expensive than group policies, are a refuge for people who are uninsured, self-employed or have recently lost employer-based coverage.
Word of the increase, the largest in policyholders' memory, has prompted the California Insurance Commissioner to order an actuarial study to determine if Anthem spends at least 70 percent of individual premiums on medical care, as required by state law.
The company, which provides individual coverage for 800,000 customers, said the increases "are merely the symptoms of a larger underlying problem in California's individual market — rising healthcare costs."
Read the Los Angeles Times' report on insurance premiums.