CONCORD – Two health insurers in New Hampshire will pay fines totaling $900,000 and make up to $1 million available in restitution to customers, according to state regulators.

John Alden Life Insurance Co. and Fortis Insurance Co. were fined for the illegal practice of placing "exclusionary riders" on customers' coverage for six years and have signed an agreement that would restore health coverage without the exclusions or a change in premium, Insurance Commissioner Roger Sevigny has announced.

The companies are both owned by Assurant Health Insurance and have not issued any comment beyond signing the agreement.

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While McCain received tremendous support inside Town Hall, protesters outside criticized him for being "more of the same" as President Bush, bringing on a continuing failing economy and urging him to do more with his health care policy.

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McCain was met outside the town hall by sign-holding demonstrators chanting, "Bush-McCain, more of the same," and was both criticized before his arrival in the state by the organized labor leaders, who called him anti-worker, and questioned by a group called New Hampshire for Health Care for not supporting universal health care.

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Meanwhile, New Hampshire for Health Care has released its analysis of health plans from each of the presidential candidates from each party. It does not rank the plans, but lays out summaries of them as a guide to voters, NHHC director John Thyng said. The group, part of SEIU's Americans for Health Care project, mailed the guides to 70,000 New Hampshire voters who have pledged to make health care access the issue on which they will judge candidates. The report is also at NHHC's Web site, www.nhforhealthcare.org.

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You can find them at almost every presidential event, easily identified by their purple shirt that say, “I’m a Heath Care Voter!” They’re New Hampshire for Heath Care, one of the many groups in the state working to influence the presidential campaigns. They show up at events, ask candidates questions regarding health care and then do it all over again, working to get specific information on how each candidate would address heath care in the country. They’re part of a larger organization, Americans for Heath Care, which started in the state in 2002 with the hope of influencing politics, making their presidential debut in 2004. They say that the heath care industry is broken in this country, with 47 million citizens without health insurance — 150,000 of in the Granite State alone. And they want presidential candidates to pledge to do something about it. Last week, the group released a report detailing the heath care plans of all the major candidates, for voters to compare.

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