Edie Sundby's Choice -- Review & Outlook, The Wall Street Journal

The ObamaCare lessons in a cancer patient's cancelled insurance.

Edie Littlefield Sundby may not have thought she'd ignite a national debate when the stage-4 cancer survivor asked us to publish her Monday op-ed on losing her oncologist due to the Affordable Care Act. But she certainly has, and it's important to understand why. Mrs. Sundby and millions like her must be denied their medical choices if ObamaCare is going to work as its liberal planners intend. 

Mrs. Sundby's seven years of gallbladder cancer treatment have been underwritten by a policy known as preferred provider organization coverage, or a PPO, from UnitedHealthcare. She says she bought the product on the individual insurance market for herself and her family in large part because it offers more choice in medical care. PPOs cost more than health-maintenance organizations (HMOs), for example, but they offer access to more doctors and hospitals.

This proved invaluable for Mrs. Sundby, who needed expert care from various providers after her diagnosis. Under her PPO, the San Diego resident could go to a local hospital for some treatments, but her main oncologist is at Stanford, and she could also seek counsel at M.D. Anderson, the renowned cancer center in Houston. The choices she has under her PPO have literally extended her life for seven years.

But in July UnitedHealthcare announced that it is withdrawing from the California individual market, and Mrs. Sundby's policy will be cancelled on December 31. A UnitedHealth spokeswoman explained the decision to us this way: "Because of UnitedHealthcare of California's historically small presence in the individual market and the fact that individual consumers in the state are well served with many competitive product offerings, we will focus on our employer group insurance and Medicare business in California for 2014."

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