Christian health care-sharing ministries an alternative to insurance

Two Corpus Christi men have put together a faith-based health care plan they believe better protects their clients than any insurance policy now on the marketplace. William Brann and Mike Tracy are co-owners of Christian Care 360, a health care-sharing ministry exempt from mandates of the Affordable Care Act. It is one of 53 health care-sharing ministries in the United States, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.
Health care-sharing ministries are organized, member-based groups that share medical costs. In existence since 1999, they are not health insurance. Currently, about 300,000 Americans reportedly belong to such ministries, in which members share the costs of catastrophic illnesses among themselves. 
With more than 20 years in the health insurance business, Brann said he and Tracy developed their version of a health care-sharing ministry four years ago in response to the Affordable Care Act. 
“Rather than waiting for things to happen to our clients, we were proactive,” he said. “We developed this to service our existing clients and bring on new clients.” 
“We looked in every direction you can imagine to find stuff that worked,” Tracy added. “Nothing out there was doing anything it needed to do. We needed to get creative.” 
They found health care-sharing ministries and used that as a basis to design a plan that would best serve individuals and small businesses. The monthly cost is half that of a plan bought through the health care cooperatives formed by the Affordable Care Act, and it offers better care for major accidents and illnesses, they said.
Here’s how it works. Instead of having a high deductible, members pay for their own day-to-day health care costs, including preventative care. In the case of a major injury or illness, they submit the bills to the christian health ministry, which looks it over and pays out of an account funded by members’ monthly payments. The money can be used to pay for direct medical expenses as well as everyday expenses that accrue when a member can’t work because of illness.
“It can be difficult for some people to understand,” Brann said. “If you went shopping for a car, you would understand a Nissan Sentra is not the same as a Mercedes. They don’t have that understanding when it comes to health care. Most people have no idea how their health care policy will perform until they get into a battle with cancer. Then they find out they are not fully covered.” 
The car analogy came up again as Brann compared high-deductible system to that of cash pay, or reimbursement, with the Christian plan. 
“If you think of office visits and preventive care, you are not looking under the hood,” he said. “Look, 85 percent of the cost of health care is cancer, and there is nothing in the Affordable Care Act that completely covers cancer.”
He stressed that health care-sharing ministries are nonprofits with a focus on helping the members, not shareholders. 
“Ninety-eight percent of the revenue we take in is spent on member services,” he said. “That’s way higher than commercial services, which is 80 percent. We don’t have profit and loss. We drive down the cost of health insurance. We provide more benefits for financial security.” 
Health care-sharing ministries originated when churches needed to cover the health care needs of missionaries around the world. 
“When you’re a missionary, you have to get health care where you can,” Tracy said. “You pay for your service. You become a cash payer and are later reimbursed by the church. We are all fundamentally cash payers. High deductibles are cash-paying plans.” 
To be a participant in the program, you sign a statement of faith stating that you do not smoke or drink and that you live a Christian life following Biblical tenets. It is done on the honor system, Brann and Tracy said. There are no background checks and no lifestyle monitoring. 
The system includes the Live Well and Call a Doc programs. Live Well provides a care advocate to help members through the system in the case of a major illness. Call a Doc is a 24-hour service for members to call for any ailment to get prescriptions and help by phone on an as-need basis. 
“This is a sharing ministry,” Brann said. “We have a charitable portion of the benefits that provides financial assistance for people in medical need. The program we’ve designed will save the average family half of the cost of typical health insurance and do a better job, if they’re willing to think outside the box.” 
For more information, visit christiancare360.com or call (361) 249-0585.