Scam Missouri ‘cost-sharing’ ministry proves health care and religion are both ailing | Opinion

The recent decision by federal law enforcement officials to shut down what they call a fraudulent, faith-based Missouri medical cost-sharing company reveals, again, a major failure of America’s health care system.

Beyond that, it gives people one more reason to be wary of initiatives marketed as religious ministries with government oversight. The reputation of legitimate institutional religion gets enough self-inflicted wounds (sex abuse scandals, money-grubbing televangelists) without a private, highly questionable health care ministry adding to the list.

The FBI and attorneys for the Department of Justice have shut down the St. Joseph-based Medical Cost Sharing Inc. Those authorities say the company marketed a well-planned fraud that drew in customers by seeking out “like-minded Christians.”

What’s especially disheartening about this is that people have complained publicly about this cost-sharing group for years. In fact, in the summer of 2017, The Star reported that at least eight people said they had paid into the fund without receiving a dime to cover their medical treatments. State and federal authorities need to explain what took them so long to act.

The legal system now will have to sort out whether crimes were committed and, if so, who should be held accountable. But what we already know is that if the American health care system worked in an equitable way, even legitimate cost-sharing ministries wouldn’t be needed. For people ineligible for Medicare and/or Medicaid (and neither of those systems is perfect), the American health insurance system is a wild, confusing mess.

Although the insurance market that’s now available to uninsured people through the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, has helped many people get necessary coverage, it’s still a stopgap measure in a system that fails to deliver health care results commensurate with its price.

The experience of some of Medical Cost Sharing’s customers has been horrific enough to deserve a quicker response from regulators and law enforcement.

For instance, as The Star has reported, Texas pastor Jeff Gore paid some $4,000 in membership fees into the fund but never received compensation for care.

“It’s ridiculous,” he concluded. “I mean, it’s been five or six years now, and the feds are just now getting involved? I was not the first complaint. The Better Business Bureau had a file opened up already. The attorney general already had a file on these people when I contacted them.”

The government now estimates that since its creation in 2013, Medical Cost Sharing has collected about $7.5 million in membership fees. How much went toward sharing the cost of the health care bills of its members? Only about $246,000 — or 3.5% of what was collected, The Star reported.

Like others, no doubt, Gore, who describes himself as a “cowboy minister” who travels a rural preaching circuit, was drawn to this company by advertising that made it seem as if it was in harmony with Gore’s own religious beliefs. The pictures of crosses, praying hands and Bible verses that were featured prominently on the Medical Cost Sharing website appealed to Gore.

“Their website said all the right things,” he told The Star back in 2017.

Using religion to sell phony products and dreams seems especially abhorrent because it violates the core ethical teachings of all the world’s great faiths. And every time it happens, the reputation of religion takes another hit. Perhaps that helps explain why there’s been an upsurge in the percentage of Americans who now identify as religiously unaffiliated. In fact, that percentage has recently climbed to close to one-third of adults in this country.

There’s no quick fix for the nation’s health insurance system. In the meantime, in a rickety structural contraption that allows the existence of such firms as Medical Cost Sharing Inc., the onus falls on consumers to make sure they’re not falling into a for-profit trap that doesn’t provide what they need. It’s a “buyer beware” health insurance world — and will remain one until there’s a reliable, equitable system in place for all Americans.