IN MY SHOES: Healthcare “Reform” Horror Stories
The Washington Times recently observed that “President Obama believes in government by anecdote.” And so, for more than a year Dems tried to guilt voters into supporting their idea of healthcare “reform” telling us about the cancer patient who couldn’t afford to continue paying her healthcare premiums and was forced to choose between her chemo and her mortgage or the woman who plundered her sister’s corpse so she could wear her dentures. These anecdotes were often not-quite-true or so over-the-top that they made us roll our eyes instead of grab a tissue to daub the tears springing from them.
Never mind that people in such dire financial straits qualify for Medicare and for low-cost or free treatment at dental school clinics and other charitable assistance – and, if all else fails, their community, neighbors and friends will pitch in to help (doctors often cut their fees for hardship cases and neighbors pull together and raise the money to help out a family struggling with huge medical bills). What really riled up those who opposed healthcare “reform” was that every heartstring-tugging story they trotted out was trumped by a gasp-inducing nationalized healthcare horror story from England, or by a heartfelt plea by a Canadian seeking competent medical treatment in the U.S. not to ruin the healthcare system that is his or her last remaining hope.
For a change of pace, The Stiletto would like to bring to your attention two horror stories of rationed – meaning unavailable or inferior – care that will become the norm under the Dems’ idea of healthcare “reform.”
For Robert Hollister, an unemployed museum curator who lives in Culver City, CA, by the time the “reform” bill’s prohibitions against denying coverage to those with pre-existing conditions kicks in, he is likely to be dead from advanced-stage metastatic colon cancer:
[I]n May of last year, I was laid off from my job of 20 years … Because of President Obama's stimulus package, I have been able to maintain my insurance through the federal COBRA plan at a subsidized rate. But that program will end for me in September. And then what? …
The [healthcare] bill calls for the creation within three months of a high-risk pool providing subsidized insurance for people with preexisting conditions. That would certainly be me. But there's a catch. To qualify, a person must have had no health insurance for six months before an application can be filed. If I have to be without insurance for six months, I'm unlikely to live long enough to qualify for the plan.
Hollister pleads with the readers of his Los Angeles Times op-ed to “propose ideas … [k]eep pushing.” Unfortunately, the legislation isn’t aimed at improving the quality of care or making quality care more affordable. It only seeks to extend coverage to more people. More is not always better, especially since we will be paying higher taxes and/or higher insurance for four years before we will benefit from healthcare “reform.” Hollister is beginning to understand the cold, cruel calculus of “reform”: The only way this massive legislation won’t add to the deficit is if people (including children) who have acute medical conditions don't live long enough (i.e., past December 31, 2013) to extract anything from it.
In a Washington Post op-ed 23-year-old Ruth Samuelson describes a problem that will become as common for young people as it is for retirees on Medicare:
It seemed like a relatively simple process: When you get sick, first call your primary-care doctor. Second, visit said doctor. Third, follow doctor's orders: Fill prescriptions, take to bed, whatever. Fourth, get better.
But what if you can't even get past Step 1?
I struggled with this problem for more than a year. After graduating from college, I returned to Washington in 2007. I'd grown up in Bethesda and used a doctor in Kensington during high school. But the journey from my office in Adams Morgan out there took about an hour and a half for car-free me. It was time to find a medical practice in the city.
Naturally, I waited until I wasn't feeling well to seriously initiate this process. But I didn't expect any problems. I was just 23, basically healthy and, most important, insured. So I pulled out my computer, looked up the UnitedHealthcare list of preapproved doctors and started calling.
And I got rejected. Again. And again. (Usually after being put on hold for three or four minutes.) …
An influx of patients will overwhelm a system already crippled by a well-documented dearth of primary-care physicians, as medical students gravitate toward more lucrative specialties.
Samuelson’s friends told her similar tales of woe.
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