“It’s a staggering amount of money and there’s nothing I can do about it,” the 49-year-old Colby says. His insurance rates soared over the past decade after his daughter, , was diagnosed with a brain tumor and his wife, Trish, developed breast cancer.

After his daughter died at age 8 in 2007, his rates dropped by a few hundred dollars a month – but then shot up by 20 percent the following year, he said.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who met Colby in Columbus last month, told his story in a in Washington, to illustrate the flaws of the nation’s health care system.

But while Colby said he supports President Barack Obama’s efforts to overhaul health care, he would like the president to do a few things differently.

A registered Republican, he told Kaiser Health News he strongly backs the administration’s attempt to ban insurers from using preexisting conditions to reject applicants or charge them higher rates. And he favors injecting more competition into the insurance market 聳 but would like to do so by using existing government programs, not creating new ones.

He said, for example, that he thinks the Federal Employees Health Benefit Program, under which members of Congress and federal employees receive coverage, should be opened to the general public. And he said he would like to see Medicare and Medicaid expanded.

Colby also said that any health overhaul plan should allow small business owners like himself to deduct the cost of health insurance from taxes the way that large employers can.

Colby, who lobbies for biotechnology, pharmaceutical and medical device companies, buys coverage through the Columbus Chamber of Commerce. He can’t change plans because no one else would sell him a policy that would cover the needs of him and his wife, and his two daughters.

The large amount he pays for insurance means he can’t afford to hire another employee or pay for policies for his existing workers. He said he decided to tell his story to Sebelius because “there’s such an air of unreality down there in D.C. it looks like the bills are put together by people who have not had to navigate the health system.”

He added, “I’m hoping and praying Congress can put aside partisanship and work together to put together a great bill. The answer is a fusion of the best ideas of the Left and Right, and lots of choices for Americans to choose from.”

Colby, who owns a four-employee lobbying and consulting firm, said he’s not sure how much longer he can afford to pay $30,000 a year for full coverage. He hopes his rates fall in 2010, which would mark five years that his wife has been cancer free.

In the event sponsored by the University of Chicago, Sebelius said many Americans don’t understand the problems facing the health system. “Some Americans hear stories like Richard’s and say, ‘That’s too bad, but I only pay a few thousand dollars in premiums a year. My employer pays the rest. So rising health costs don’t really affect me.’

“The problem with that theory is that those rising premiums come out of your paycheck. So, for example, over the last 10 years, the average cost of a family health insurance premium went up $7,000. That’s $7,000 that could have gone into Americans’ pockets.”

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