economy, health care, obama, stimulus, conservative, liberal, congress
What percentage of people who declare bankruptcy due to medical bills have health insurance? 68%. What percentage of people who declare bankruptcy do so due to medical bills? 50%. (Link)
Yup, that's right: health insurance won't help you if you develop a devastating illness. Get cancer, lose your house.
Isn't life grand?
Today I will spend the better part of my day scamming the system. Not that I want to, it's totally unethical, not to mention a waste of my time, but because I have to.
See, I 've developed a problem. I don't know what it is, and I can't afford to find out. I have a $500 deductible that I can't pay. So, I can't go to my doctor or get tests done unless I can come up with $500. At the beginning of every year, I may as well not have insurance.
What are my options? Well, I suppose I could rob a bank- or I go to the hospital, sit in the ER for 6, maybe 10, hours with some vague complaint that will force a bill over $600. (I owe the first $100 dollars of ER visits unless I get admitted.) I end up waiting 10 hours because I keep the complaint vague enough that they don't put me ahead of people with immediate problems. (What's wrong with me may really be a problem, but I've had it for 3 weeks, so it's not an immediate problem.)
Then, when I'm done, I have to stiff the hospital for the bill. I can't come up with $500, and the hospital will let me come back if I don't pay them. My doctor, not so much.
Everyone's making a big deal about "socialism" (though I doubt those people know what socialism is) and "spending bills" (please, explain to me the difference between "stimulus" and "spending") and how families don't fix their finances by spending more (yeah, because the economy of your household and the economy of the entire country are two completely different things). [I read a really awesome article on this that I now can't find. If you can help me out with linkage, please do. My comments do allow for ahref.]
Well, you explain to me why a person who works hard and has insurance can't afford to go to the doctor without engaging in hospital chicanery first- then explain to me why that's better than Obama's plan. Be prepared to show your work.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
6 comments:
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As a Canadian I find it difficult to even grasp the problems that many Americans face just trying to get medical treatment. (A $500.00 deductible would have caused problems for me on many occasions.) Although I've said this before, I think it bears repeating.
ReplyDeleteVis a vis American health care, 5 per cent of the world's population consume 25 per cent of the worlds resources and still cannot provide medical care for somewhere around 15 per cent of the population. Although people may argue about how to fix that, how can anyone not agree that this is wrong?
Good luck.
thanks! I just watched a republican argue that feeding people and providing healthcare is unamerican. That's something to be proud of
ReplyDeleteOh my, I wish you luck. It's really awful that you have to come up with ways to scam a medical system like this. I know my step-father does this regularly because he is on disability and can't afford insurance, but disability gives him too much money to qualify for medicare. So instead he has to rack up a large bill, large enough for the state to step in and take care of it, because he's on disability. It's insane.
ReplyDeleteThat's what my hubby had to do when he got MS. He had to rack up over $20k in bills so the state would take over and pay for the care he actually needed right away that he couldn't get at a hospital anyway.
ReplyDeleteBasically, the system is set up in a way that forces you to abuse it.
...........
ReplyDeletei wish ... i don't know how to phrase it... i wish you didn't need medical care, that no one did, that the world were better...
yeah
c'mon, obama, you've got a mandate- let's go!
ReplyDelete