It is suggested that for the 39% hike in health insurance by Wellpoint Inc., the economy is to be blamed. But such hikes which hit a huge number of Americans, (about 46 million) with no insurance at all, go unnoticed.

People who don't get insurance through their jobs and plan to buy individual policies like the ones in WellPoint's Anthem Blue Cross plan, won’t buy if the prices rise.

"I know the American people get frustrated in debating something like health care because you get a whole bunch of different claims being made by different groups and different interests", President Barack Obama said while addressing the Anthem hike.

About 5% of non-elderly Americans have individual insurance and 60% are covered by their employers.

The company defended the hike by stating that the result was an insured pool that utilized significantly more services per individual than under better economic times.

But Will Dow, a professor of health economics at the University of California, said that the rate hike reflected an individual insurance market that was fundamentally broken.

“Individuals who are in ill health and don't have access to an employer-provided health insurance policy are subject to the mercies of this market, which does not work well for sick people", Dow said.