Just out of college, I went without health coverage for a couple of anxious months while I chewed Vitamin C and crossed my fingers. Once I got insurance, I found myself chewing on a lot of Cheerios just to afford the monthly payments. I paid nearly as much for my health insurance every month as I did my rent.  

Health insurance is a necessity that fewer and fewer Americans have. Less than half of the people in this country have employer-provided healthcare plans. Many others are burdened with medical debt that will prevent them from living the life they should be living (on their income) for years. Medical debt is cited as the cause of more than half of all bankruptcies last year, and young adults are increasingly the largest demographic to go without medical coverage. Others pay out of pocket for their own health insurance (like I do today), costing sometimes a quarter or a third of monthly take-home pay.

Hopefully, things will change, and are changing. So far, the pace has been slow.  But this next shift in the White House may move things further along, more quickly, or not.

Here’s what you can do in the meantime to make sure you have some coverage and don’t end up on the bad end of the medical-debt stick:

1. If you’re a recent college grad, check in on your parents’ insurance for a discounted payment plan to extend coverage to you beyond 21. If you’re a full-time student, look into eHealthInsurance.com, and their student insurance plan.
2. If you end up in the hospital without health insurance, do not hand over your credit card.  Ask for a bill. Once you put your stay on a credit card you are liable for that full amount. But if you keep the debt with the hospital, you can renegotiate the full amount. Demand, and then pour over your bills looking for hidden, bloated, costs you can talk down - such as $35 for a box of tissues - and ask about any terms you don’t understand that have a dollar-sign attached to them. For example, those tissues may be listed as “topical bio-waste disposal” or something more humorous (or insulting).  
3. If you’re self-employed or own your own business, look into a union connected to your line of work that may offer lower, negotiated rates for coverage. For example, the Freelancers Union originally negotiated local coverage in the New York City area, but is now offering lower-cost self-coverage plans in other states. Head to Freelancersunion.org.
4. If you have to pay for your own coverage, but can’t afford full coverage, get a high-deductible insurance plan. High-deductible plans (once known as catastrophic coverage) lower your monthly costs by having you pay more out of pocket, up front. The advantage is that should you need serious medical attention, you’ll be out a couple thousand of dollars rather than hundreds of thousands of dollars. Shop at Esurance.com. It’s worth the cost.