Angrier and angrier I get.
I keep hearing people saying that they’re worried about losing their health insurance. The Rethuglicans keep saying the American people are happy with their insurance providers and their doctors. Really? I’ve spent the last 3 weeks dealing with insurance companies, doctors, hospitals, pharmacies and whoever else I had to deal with and at no point have I thought “Wow, insurance companies are awesome.”
Isn’t it patently clear that the insurance companies need to be eliminated? How in the world has the Republican party convinced American people to argue on the behalf of the very companies that turn down our claims, cancel our health plans, and overcharge us for the privilege?
And another thing? Why aren’t we going after the pharmaceutical companies? Yesterday I received 36 boxes (72 doses) of generic Imitrex (sumitriptan succinate) at a cost of $5,200 (not my cost – what the drug costs). That is $72 per dose; for generic. There has got to be the understanding that controlling costs in the healthcare industry without reigning in the pharmaceutical industry is like losing weight while maintaing that Cheesecake Factor diet. Of course when your Chief of Staff is in the pocket of the pharmas.
Thoughts?
Yeah, it’s pretty frustrating. I feel lucky because (for now at least) my only real health-care costs are for preventative medicine. But because I’m self-employed and have to buy my own insurance I have a high deductible to make it affordable. So each time I get a physical or an eye exam or an immunization or whatever, I pay for it out of my pocket. My husband has a “pre-existing condition,” so his costs are even more outrageous. (He’s also self-employed.) He’s been getting his meds from India and Australia–otherwise the cost is just ridiculous.
Oh–did you know that if you’re in the CIA, the government doesn’t provide health insurance for you? They don’t want the paper trail. I have an uncle who worked in the CIA for years and didn’t get his own health insurance. At some point in his travels he picked up a weird disease and has now lost all his teeth (not to mention his money) and has a number of other serious ailments as well. Sure, he should have gotten himself insured…but this is just one more illustration of a very flawed health-care system.
I am blessed right now with good health insurance through my employer, but that doesn’t extend to eye care. The eye care coverage is minimal, at best, and that is why I went bankrupt when I lost part of my vision. It was either “go into so much debt, a bankruptcy is your only choice” or “be blind in one eye & never drive again”. What an awesome choice, huh? My friends in Europe were all horrified, of course. I will likely never own my own home and, if my landlords sell the little condo apartment where I live, I will have to ask my older brother to sign for me on a lease because I have no credit now. At 43. Because a blood vessel grew up behind my retina. Ah, America!
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Well the more accurate statement might be most Americans are satisfied with their health and therefore satisfied with theri health insurance because they don't have to use it and don't know what it covers or doesn't cover.
People in the US are going to have to put individual differences aside and either always pay (a reasonable rate) or face going to the end of the line or getting declined for health care or the curretn system will keep going till it blows up. Will the US go bankrupt or the health care system simply stop working first? It's going to be a race to the finish!
My thoughts for coming up with something that works, gives people choice to have and pay for (or not have and pay the consequences if they choose to gamble with) health insurance at the link.
I have what the Senate Finance Committee might well view as a "Cadillac" health plan, and I can tell you from personal experience that it is full of holes.
The penny ante denials they try to get away with have perplexed both my doctor and me more than a few times. And I concur with Adam's basic statement that most Americans think they're satisfied with their health insurance because they haven't really taken it for much of a test drive yet.
The question most people can't answer about their health coverage is whether it will be there when they really need it — in far too many situations the answer is NO. Which is one of the most pressing reasons why it needs to be fixed. And I hope the folks in Congress (and the White House) won't be cowed by others whose only goal is to keep the system from getting fixed.