The online health insurance marketplaces can't open soon enough for Chris and Kristi Petersen. Enrolled in the Iowa high-risk insurance pool because insurers on the private market won't cover them, the couple pays more than $1,300 each month for a plan with a $2,500 annual deductible and a 20 percent copay for medical services. It's more than they can afford. Change is coming for many of the roughly 220,000 people in 35 state high-risk pools, although they may not know it yet. The pools, some of which have been in existence for decades, offer last-resort coverage for people like the Petersens who have medical conditions that make them otherwise uninsurable.
