He wouldn't be denied. Some company would take him; it would just charge him out the wazoo to do it.
Those would be denials by UNITED HEALTHCARE. How does that translate into another company not taking that same guy with lung cancer (if the price is right, that is)?
Not necessarily. My counterpart sees this in his departments all the time. Here is a simple breakdown of how they get away with it.
Person goes to ABC Insurance and is denied.
Person goes to DEF Insurance and is denied.
so on and so on...
Finally MNO insurance company takes him on for an atrocious fee. It is only going to be for a very basic and limited plan. Anything like lung cancer or whatever will not be covered any way. It is just going to be a basic doctor's office visit and insurance prescription copay. So even if they do take him, it would pretty much exclude whatever condition he had that caused the other insurance companies to reject him. The dreaded "pre-existing condition" clause...
Sort of like car insurance, if one insurance company denies you because you have wrecks, or multiple DUIS or whatever..., then better much all of the major carriers are going to deny you as well. You might find some small Mom&Pop (just an example) type insurance company that will insure you, but it will be very very limited and restricted coverage for an incredibly high fee. They will probably just be no-fault liability type insurance.
Insurance companies and their bullshit are pretty much the main reason that I made sure I had ER, OR and BB departments as my first pick here at the hospital and not stuck with Billing or Medical Coding, etc.. departments.