In one of the best righteous tirades all week, Washington Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler ordered Regence to take back their decision to eliminate child-only policies. Following last month’s national health care reform act, which told insurance companies that they couldn’t screen kids for pre-existing conditions when deciding what to cover, Regence decided that, if they couldn’t be discriminatory as to which kids they cover, they needed to eliminate their child-only coverage altogether–a decision presumably made in an underground volcano lair.Regence had notified the commission on September 27 that it would no longer sell child-only health policies effective October 1–after that, children could only be enrolled through family health plans. Kriedler was “appalled.”The decision, he says, violates state laws that prohibit denying insurance coverage based on age.Kriedler says that most insurance companies “did the right thing” in not eliminating child-only policies. He says that he’s gotten “hundreds” of complaints since Regence’s decision and that “Frankly, Regence deserves the backlash,” adding that he’s “sick and tired of the insurance industry pulling these stunts.”Way to lay it down, Kriedler! The Washington Insurance Commission is for the children.