Dad Wins Fight for Son's Health Coverage

DALLAS - A father fighting for insurance coverage for his newborn has finally gotten the response he wanted.

Baby Houston Tracy was born on March 15 and immediately needed life-saving open heart surgery.

Doug Tracy said neither he nor his wife have health insurance because they are self employed. But they have policies with Blue Cross Blue Shield for their older children.

They contacted the insurance company before Houston was born. They were told they needed to wait.

But after Houston was born his application was denied. The insurance company claimed he had a pre-existing condition.

Blue Cross Blue Shield told FOX 4 it does not comment on specific cases, but if a mother is covered her newborn is too.

Houston’s mother does not have a policy, so his application had to be considered individually. And, his heart condition existed before the application was filed.

“I’m not backing down from this fight because I don’t understand how something can be pre-existing when he didn’t exist yet. He was still in the womb and there was no way to detect that,” Tracy said during a previous interview.

Now after a media blitz that included a Facebook page and several news stories, Tracy said Blue Cross Blue Shield did an about face.

They decided to cover Houston from the day of his birth through March 26, including the costly surgery. In the future he will be covered by a Texas Health Insurance Risk Pool policy.

Tracy said he just wants to get back to being a dad.

“I think that they had to step up and do the right thing. And, I feel blessed that they did,” he said.

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• Dad Fights Health Insurance Battle for Baby