Yet the major House and Senate measures would end what many consider another long-standing, discriminatory practice: basing rates on gender, which is now allowed in most states.

Some are wondering whether middle-age and older consumers are victims of age discrimination.

According to Sen. John Kerry (D., Mass.), “Allowing insurers to charge older Americans vastly higher premiums simply because of their age is discrimination, pure and simple.”

On the issue of gender variations, the National Women’s Law Center sees substantial differences in rates. In a 2008 survey, the center found that in 47 states and the District of Columbia where insurers used gender ratings, the premiums charged 40-year-old women were between 4 percent and 48 percent more than for men of the same age.

Women tend to pay more for health coverage because insurers find they use more health-care services than men, and because any women of childbearing age could become pregnant.

Lawmakers explained that charging older people more, though, also could be justified with data. “Age rating is a common practice in insurance underwriting,” said Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D., N.M.).

But so are gender differentials. Why are they being eliminated?

Senate staffers said one reason was that age-based premiums can be justified by consumers’ experience, while gender-based differentials relying somewhat on potential pregnancy has the look of being blatantly discriminatory. Experts have determined that age-based premiums can be justified as six to seven times as high as those charged the people with the lowest health risks.

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