Americas Uninsured (Health Insurance)
A blog of one’s own
Uninsured in the United States
Blogging is a relatively fresh technology that has helped shape how people communicate. With the attend of the internet, minority groups have been able to earn public succor and attention from their blog posts. The internet has gained mass popularity in the previous 15 years growing at an exponential rate; it allows us to come anyone anywhere at the race of light. Blogging is essential because the average person can now project their message to millions of people online almost instantly. Blogs have become a key tool for minority groups to acquire their plan across without spending a lot of money. They have empowered and given a hiss to, people without adequate health insurance, and will be able to assist more people in the future if the trend of blogging continues.
More than 44.8 Million people in the United States do not have health insurance (Wattenberg). This causes a astronomical deal of pains for the average person living in the United States. The query is whether or not health insurance is worth the amount of money they will have to utilize or if they even have the money to exhaust on it. They then will notice at the opportunity cost; this is what they will have to give up if they don’t consume health insurance. When struggling to compose this decision they often spy at themselves as healthy and won’t need or can’t afford health insurance. Health insurance costs on average of $10,880 dollars per family, however most companies screen a expansive fraction of,this cost, thus making it cost on average $2,713 per year (Appleby). These numbers are staggering for the average family in America who manufacture only $48,201 per year.
The uninsured in the USA are a seemingly invisible group to political elite and law makers. The dilemma with Universal healthcare is that it would, in theory, give everyone an equal opportunity at who gets what doctor. In other words there would be no “better” hospital to visit if you were wealthy or had some sort of influence. The documentary Sicko Michael Moore outlines what happens to people without health insurance in the USA, and it also largely covers what happens to people who have health insurance but their idea limits how mighty care they can receive. The documentary also includes what happens to people who live in countries who have universal healthcare. The documentary was an gross bias towards Universal Healthcare, but it outlined many facts. The following quote comes from the Institute of Medicine, was featured in the movie Sicko, and indicates the severity of the US healthcare pickle.
According to the Institute of Medicine, “lack of health insurance causes roughly 18,000 unnecessary deaths every year in the United States. Although America leads the world in spending on health care, it is the only wealthy, industrialized nation that does not ensure that all citizens have coverage.” (“Insuring America’s Health: Principles and Recommendations”)
This is a scary number of people that die each year from the lack of financial means in the United States. With the institution of Universal Healthcare that number would be down to zero.
The scary facts about United States unique healthcare system are that the United States Government is doing petite in the arrangement of making this number go down. Hillary Clinton, one of the biggest supporters of Universal Healthcare, was bought out by the drug companies and doctors in the effect of campaign money. She is the second highest recipient of money from the unique healthcare system; thus causing a conundrum (Christensen). How can the government fix the unique spot when the candidates themselves are in the pockets of the healthcare system and enormous drug manufacturers? Most thought it as a predicament, but do not know the extent of the problem; the healthcare companies are spending more and more money hiring people to fight congress over healthcare plans. In fact, there are 2,084 lobbyist and only 535 members of congress (Mayor).
The uninsured are a mammoth marginalized group in the United States that are not being represented by the government with adequate representation. The drug companies have the most to lose if the United States government adopts universal healthcare. They will lose the most because true now they are making their fortune off the modern health insurance thought in the United States. They compose their money off not treating everyone and from their high premiums. The unique Bush administration has been urged by the drug companies to not agree to a universal healthcare system. They offer payouts to high political figures such as George W. Bush himself. This money is unbiased a share of the amount of money that these drug companies receive every year from American families.
The uninsured American has no device to argue with the insurance or drug companies over how powerful their care will cost them. To set aside it simply, they can’t. The following is a quote from Kuro5hin.org which posted this argument about bargaining rights of the uninsured:
“An individual who needs medical care has no bargaining power whatsoever with a hospital. He can either agree to pay whatever he is charged, or he can die. There are no other choices. In some cases, the government will force him to rep medical care – if he is a minor child in a family that does not wish to earn him any for religious or financial reasons, or if he is considered not to be in possession of reason – but he will tranquil be billed. Refusing medical care for a unsafe or fatal condition is something most people won’t do – and may, in fact, be considered evidence of insanity which takes away the patient’s legal to refuse treatment at all. He can’t journey out because the label seems unreasonable. In some cases negotiation is fruitful, but often it isn’t.”
This following scenario is a proper plot that far too many Americans face who are uninsured. They have no procedure to pay off their bill so they can only determine to refuse care instead, often doing this to wait on their families financially. Their bills often net so high that if they chose to die, it would be better financially. So are we putting a impress on human life?
Scared by the wintry shoulder that the U.S. Senate shows the uninsured, I looked into staunch life accounts of uninsured persons in the United States and their chilling stories. The following account touched me because it is of a hard working miner named Lenny who worked all his life in unforgiving conditions. He survived a mine fire which killed 91 of his co-workers. This didn’t terminate Lenny from returning to work, because after all he had three kids and with his job tall health care. Unfortunately for Lenny he had health care up until the mine he worked for laid everyone off. This left Lenny with serious health problems from working underground for twenty years. He would eventually need medical care; so he applied for a job that offered medical assistance, and the only derive was that it took 60 days to go into achieve. The following comes from (Sered and Fernandopulle):
“The luck that had made Lenny one of the survivor’s of the 1972 mine fire had rush out. Only 30 days after he began the job, he fell down onto the pavement in paunchy cardiac arrest. Paramedics flew him to Spokane, Wash., to a cardiac unit. His recovery was far better than anyone expected, but he was saddled with tall medical bills. A year later, he was sent to the hospital for angioplasty and eventually open-heart surgery. The doctors saved his life, but Lenny is unruffled suffering acute headaches as a result of falling to the pavement when he experienced the initial cardiac arrest. The cardiologist sent him to an otolaryngologist, who then sent him to other specialists for treatments; none has eliminated his headaches.
The bill for his various surgeries, consultations, medications, and treatments is more than $140,000—it might as well be $1 billion in terms of Lenny ever being able to pay it. His sole income at this time is the $400/month pension he receives from the mining company.
The second ending to Lenny’s account is a bit different. Speaking with feeling about the first time he had to ask for public assistance, tears arrive into his eyes, which seems incongruous for a man who went abet down into the mine as soon as the smoke from the deadly fire had cleared out. “We have worked all of our lives, even went to work sick,” Lenny says. And now, instead of the dignity of automatic access to care, he depends on the golden heart of the county indigent assistance program.”
Lenny’s case is not an isolated one by any means; many people are uninsured and portion similar stories about how the flaws of the fresh healthcare system.
Recently the blogging phenomenon has allowed many people with internet access to be able to fragment their healthcare stories with the world. Many people who can’t afford insurance can’t afford the cost of high hurry internet which is required in order to blog. However, many public libraries offer this service and this allows many to have a order when they wouldn’t previously. Healthinsuranceblog.com offers many different facts about the benefits of healthcare and what could happen if you don’t have it. The blog does not give actual life accounts of people who are uninsured, but they wait on raise awareness of what it means to not have insurance. The blog brings up a grand point about why Universal Healthcare in the United States is unlikely, we don’t have the money to provide healthcare for everyone. The government currently does not have the allocated funds to hide insurance for everyone. With a tax it might be able to afford healthcare, but currently there is not enough money. Over 55% of the uninsured don’t pay taxes (healthinsuranceblog) and there would have to be higher taxes for everyone while only some people encourage. Health Insurance Blog is a political blog that outlines what the upcoming presidential candidates serve for health care.
Healthcare is often a matter of life and death for many. Without health insurance, the uninsured cannot afford routine doctors visits so if there is something putrid with them it is not detected until it’s too leisurely. Most of the illness that people net can be easily treated with pleasant care, but since most people apprehension the cost of a doctors or hospital visit they are left untreated.
Uninsured persons utilize political candidates to attend win their message to the public about how vital their situations are. On the website healthinsuranceblog.com the democratic author talked about how politicians are getting the public aware of what it is like to be uninsured:
“In the Democratic Party primaries of 1988, for example, candidate Michael Dukakis talked about a young single mother who had two jobs and unruffled could not afford medical insurance for herself and her children. In 1992, Bill Clinton did the same, changing the narrative only slightly. This time it was the case of a woman with diabetes who could not fetch health insurance because of her chronic condition. And now, in the 2008 primaries, Hillary Rodham Clinton (whom I worked with on the White House Health Care Reform Task Force in 1993) describes a similar case. This time it is a single woman, with two daughters, who cannot pay her medical bills because her congenital heart defect makes it impossible for her to get medical insurance coverage. And Barack Obama describes similar cases, with the eloquence that characterizes all of his speeches. He frequently refers to his contain mother, who had cancer and had to anxiety not only about her illness but about paying her medical bills.”
Healthcare cannot wait great longer. Americans are dying every day because they can’t afford to go to catch a routine doctors visit or they can’t afford their medication. I looked at the earning of the CEO of GlaxoSmithKline which is one of the larger providers of health insurance, Jean-Pierre Garnier the CEO made $9.4 million dollars last year. How is it aesthetic that many people in the United States are uninsured and can’t afford to score the benefit they need, and the CEO’s of the companies that are denying them affordable healthcare are making a huge salary. When people have to work two jobs impartial to be able to afford to pay for their medications, why should insurance and drug companies continue to be making such a broad profit?
Internet savvy users who happen to be uninsured illustrate their hardships over the internet. Oftentimes, people without healthcare who have problems have a hard time expressing their feelings about their situations because they either can’t afford to exercise the internet or are too frustrated. The internet, along with blogs, has become a tool for people to verbalize their notion without the censor of mainstream media. Blogs are written by people who have a sigh and without an agenda (for the most fraction anyway; there are also corporate blogs).
Health care blogs are written by numerous people including, doctors, people without health insurance, and supporters of healthcare for everyone also known as universal healthcare. The commonwealthfund.org is an internet spot that describes stories of people without healthcare and their hardships. The state is made for people to get awareness of how awful it is to not have healthcare, and even roam down the stereotypes of people without health insurance. One stereotype I musty to have is that people without health insurance are indolent, and or did not work hard enough to be able to afford it so it was be their fault for not having it. After looking at this dwelling that gives minorities a philosophize, I learned that even college-educated men and woman have a hard time getting health care.
One profile on commonwealthfund.org was of a college graduate named Ryan who had to decide whether or not to catch a job based on income or healthcare. He was a healthy young individual who did not contemplate he would need healthcare so he decided to lift a job teaching which did not offer respectable benefits. Ryan fell down on his apartment stairs and harm his knee, he now has very high hospital bills to pay off. He later had to hold a job that paid less but offers health benefits. Ryan ended up getting care for his knee in Chili because they did not charge as powerful and offered equal or better service. The seek information from I have to ask after reading Ryan’s account that he told was why should anyone have to determine between a career or a job that offers health benefits? What happened to what we were told as kids: “we can be anything we want to be? ” The truth is with our recent idea many Americans are finding themselves working for adequate health service.
Blogs have become an wonderful get of education for people who did not know about what is happening to the uninsured. With the unusual popularity of blogs, many are using their impart to disprove popular misconceptions about what is it like to not be fully covered by their insurance company when they need care. After reading all the Profiles of the uninsured on commonwealthfund.org I wanted to know more about how we could find their stories across to more people. The upcoming election for president has given the most power to the uninsured. The biggest dilemma that is being addressed besides the Iraq war is the topic of affordable healthcare for all. The fact is that healthcare is only affordable for the average American making under $50,000 for a family is one that is mostly covered by their employer. But with the economy falling without or limited growth since 2001 has not made it accessible for cramped companies to provide healthcare for their employees.
Minute business owners are finding it increasingly difficult to afford the cost of healthcare for employees. Microscopic businesses have to deal with high taxes by the government on their income (this number is usually around 35% but can very situation by residence), this is a high number so the amount of funds left after paying for overhead is very miniature. The goal of puny business it to expand and grow, but how can they afford to do that with all the costs they have? If healthcare cost less for business owners the economy would follow suit. It would grow, and I dare say we would be out of the recession that we are currently in. There is itsy-bitsy in get of growth in the United States compared to other developing nations.
Universal Healthcare to many Americans is not vital to them because they are already covered; however I am concerned about it because the United States is doing so poorly economically. Blogs have been critical in addressing the mutter of how considerable money in being spent by individuals every year. In 2003 1.3 trillion dollars was spent on healthcare by the American people. This is an alarming amount of money that is going to something that is under regulated as far as notice goes. The drug companies and insurance companies are taking a spacious share of all Americans income each year. Healthcare blogs have played a sizable role in getting the public’s attention at this utter. They often acquire issues aware to us that we may not have known about; blogs unlike mainstream media are not censored and do not have a corporate sponsor. Americans who do not have health insurance bag their stories about their hardships on blogs or others write about them on their behalf.
I found a family member in my family who did not have health insurance. I learned last year she had a major operation on her succor, and I often wondered how she was going to pay for it. I conducted an interview with her and what I found out was disturbing. I have to say I am slightly bias towards this because she is a family member; however it does not effect the facts any less chilling.
My Aunt Lisa Herbert is a working class woman who did not accomplish high school or serve any formal schooling after she dropped out. She got pregnant at the young age of 15 and had her first child at the age of 16. Lisa had a tough life from her teenage years. She had a hard time raising a kid at her age; she went through multiple husbands and boyfriends who would promise to select care of her children but left her financially ruined. Lisa’s anecdote regarding medical insurance starts two years ago in 2006. From all aspects she had a hard life but she wanted to detached effect something of herself, she got a job at a Dunkin Donuts as was promoted rapidly to manager. She was enjoying for the first time in her life financial freedom even if it was small; she had the sense of independence. She went to work unprejudiced as she has always done one day in the winter; she fell on the ice leading up to the Dunkin Donuts she worked at. She fractured one her vertebras, however not life threatening, neither were her injuries threatening enough to accomplish her become a paraplegic. However she was composed injured. Lisa could not pace or be mobile for over 6 months; now imagine this as she described to me, she was finally becoming financially independent and was proud to become a manager, then after one accident she landed in the hospital. She did not have valid insurance; she had what Dunkin Donuts provided for her. She was “lucky” in the sense that because she did not have the financial means to sue them. Dunkin Donuts gave her the pay for the 6 months that she was not working. She took this as a gift, but from my point of opinion she could have got more out of them if she had money. Lisa then had to pay overwhelming medical bills (the real amount was not disclosed) that mounted on her already oppressed residence.
Lisa’s account is not an isolated one or even a rarity in the United States. Many workers who are working either retail or chain restaurants are not making it financially. The rising cost of healthcare that is not provided from the companies that they are working for is overwhelming and often times unaffordable. The blogging community is unbiased starting to purchase up issues of social injustice that is being done to marginalized groups such as the medically uninsured in the United States and giving them a convey. These groups should not be silenced because they do not have enough money to pay for reliable care or routine visits.
I want to address one considerable pronounce that the readers of this paper may be having; I have talked a lot about universal healthcare and how the uninsured need care as well. Many Americans that I have spoken to said that they don’t want snide quality care if we decided to do universal healthcare. I have a personal fable I want to allotment to determined up any confusion with the quality of nonprofit hospitals or hospitals that offer free care. When I was the age of 15 I had a severe flat foot quandary, with health insurance that covered nearly 99% of all medical bills my parents had to pay over $3,000 out of pocket for treatment in order to score custom made orthotics for my feet and other care. They did not work. I ended up going to a hospital in Springfield Massachusetts that offered free orthopedic care to anyone under the age of 18; we did this only because all the “specialists” we visited did not assist my condition. My doctor I had was the top orthopedic surgeon at the hospital and could rival any at a paying hospital. He suggested a current treatment for my feet without surgery and gave me free orthotics that actually helped. My family had the money to net nearly any doctor that would abet me however this was the only doctor that knew what he was doing that we visited so far. He was tranquil paid but by donations (he drove a 7 series BMW so he was getting paid a lot). I reflect that Americans that are opposing universal healthcare have a hooked understanding on what it means to not have insurance pay for their care. I want to address one more thing, I found out about this hospital from a healthcare blog (can’t remember which one) which had other patients writing about their care and how they were helped by this hospital.
Universal healthcare to many is something that we want and strive for in America; but the ask we have to ask is can we afford it? A gawk was done on the National Center for Political Analysis website outlining what would happen if we adopted universal healthcare today. According to the location if we were to seek at another universal healthcare conception such as Sweden’s, America would suffer far beyond what it is suffering today. Due to lower funding to hospitals through taxes instead of the healthcare providers, we would experience the following, a chase in unique staff for hospitals, reduction in staff at hospitals and clinics, reduction in beds at hospitals to house patients, undertrained people taking on higher responsibilities such as surgery (Larson,1). This makes it hard for us to deem universal healthcare in America when there are so many negatives. However should the voices of the uninsured that are dying simply because they can’t afford their premiums be silenced?
Many of the uninsured living in America now are between the ages of 20-30, these by all means are young healthy individuals who feel like they will never need insurance until past the age of 30. They believe, what are the odds of getting sick? They are classified by the insurance agencies as “young invincibles” these are the people who do not have the average $3,000 a year to expend on health insurance let alone if their employer even offers it. Jake Hollner is by all rights a young healthy individual who at the age of 24 is working for Home Depot and is an artist piece time. He missed the insurance that Home Depot offers as it is only offered once a year in a two week time frame. He conception to himself that he did not have the money to afford insurance (he was only making $6 an hour) so why bother? The money he would achieve from the insurance could be effect to his medical bill if he had a onetime accident. He suffered from stomach ulcers since his undergraduate years in college, these ulcers objective starting coming relieve so he decided to bite the bullet and go to the doctors for assist. He paid $200 for the visit and $73 for the prescription. This was his entire paycheck for the week but he was gorgeous proper? The ulcers did not go away after he took his medication; he had to do the unthinkable for an uninsured person, he went to the emergency room. He lost his gamble with not having insurance he ended up paying a fortune for his ulcer coverage because he was without health insurance. The staunch costs were not disclosed. Jake before the doctor visit could barely afford rent and other living expenses including health insurance (Amsden, 1).
There are other stories such as Jake’s out there, where young people who are rarely sick do not have the coverage they need in case of an emergency. The healthcare providers commented on this blog which Jake’s chronicle was on. They gave him a link to acquire affordable healthcare through them, the provider is Blue Injurious Blue Shield. Even if there was “affordable” healthcare to many, how could someone like Jake who was only making $6 an hour be able to fix his other expenses? There is no cutting corners in his case, he has no money and is living on necessities.
With the institution of universal healthcare people such as Jake would not have to pay a lot to fetch coverage since he does not obtain a lot. Why is it that in America the better off richer class doesn’t want to benefit everyone else? Universal healthcare redistributes the wealth that we are not getting a share of. When the majority of our wealth is going to the 1/10 of the top 1% in our country how can the rest of us afford to live? In theory, their money would benefit fund everyone else with healthcare from their taxes. Wouldn’t it be better to live in a community where everyone helps each other, and there is no one who has to decide between eating or taking their child to the doctor’s office?
Universal healthcare is a topic that cannot be ignored any longer. We have too many people living amongst us who simply cannot afford the absurd premiums that the insurance companies are charging. The people that are dying because they cannot afford regular doctors visits are accurate people who have families and people that rely on them. This is a change that will need to be addressed as our fresh president comes into office in the year.
Amsden, David. A Generation Uninsured. 26 March 2007. 10 4 2008 .
Appleby, Julie. USA Today. 12 February 2004. 2008 .
Blarney. Kuro5hin. 30 October 2003. 2006 .
“Blogging it.” Modern Healthcare 34.37 (13 Sep. 2004): 42-42. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Residence Library, Keene, NH 26 February 2008. .
Dalmia, Shikha. “Saying No to CoerciveCare.” Wall Street Journal – Eastern Edition 31 Jan. 2008: A16. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Spot Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. st-live&scope=site>.
Devore, Chuck. “Schwarzenegger’s Universal Healthcare Suffers Setback.” Human Events 64.5 (04 Feb. 2008): 7-14. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Situation Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
healthinsurance. Health Insurance Blog. 25 March 2008. 2008 .
McCabe, Patrick. Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. 27 April 2005. 2008 .
Moore, Michael. Sicko check up the facts. 2008 .
NCPA. Lessons from Sweden’s Universal Healthcare. 24 4 2008. 24 4 2008 .
(NCPA)”Outliers.” Modern Healthcare 37.34 (27 Aug. 2007): 68-68. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Set Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
Susan Sered and Rushika Fernandopulle, M.D. The Celebrated Wealth Fund. 2 February 2005. 2008 .
Thielst, Christina Beach. “Weblogs: A Communication Tool.” Journal of Healthcare Management 52.5 (Sep. 2007): 287-289. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Place Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
“Wanna play politics, kid? D.C. welcomes you to the mammoth leagues.” Modern Healthcare 37.41 (15 Oct. 2007): 36-36. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Set Library, Keene, NH. 21 February 2008. .
Wattenberg, Ben. PBS. 2003. 12 4 2008 .
A blog of one’s own
Uninsured in the United States
Blogging is a relatively unique technology that has helped shape how people communicate. With the support of the internet, minority groups have been able to fetch public wait on and attention from their blog posts. The internet has gained mass popularity in the previous 15 years growing at an exponential rate; it allows us to arrive anyone anywhere at the hurry of light. Blogging is valuable because the average person can now project their message to millions of people online almost instantly. Blogs have become a key tool for minority groups to acquire their thought across without spending a lot of money. They have empowered and given a insist to, people without adequate health insurance, and will be able to abet more people in the future if the trend of blogging continues.
More than 44.8 Million people in the United States do not have health insurance (Wattenberg). This causes a huge deal of inconvenience for the average person living in the United States. The inquire of is whether or not health insurance is worth the amount of money they will have to use or if they even have the money to consume on it. They then will peep at the opportunity cost; this is what they will have to give up if they don’t grasp health insurance. When struggling to get this decision they often stare at themselves as healthy and won’t need or can’t afford health insurance. Health insurance costs on average of $10,880 dollars per family, however most companies mask a gigantic fragment of,this cost, thus making it cost on average $2,713 per year (Appleby). These numbers are staggering for the average family in America who fabricate only $48,201 per year.
The uninsured in the USA are a seemingly invisible group to political elite and law makers. The jam with Universal healthcare is that it would, in theory, give everyone an equal opportunity at who gets what doctor. In other words there would be no “better” hospital to visit if you were wealthy or had some sort of influence. The documentary Sicko Michael Moore outlines what happens to people without health insurance in the USA, and it also largely covers what happens to people who have health insurance but their thought limits how distinguished care they can receive. The documentary also includes what happens to people who live in countries who have universal healthcare. The documentary was an improper bias towards Universal Healthcare, but it outlined many facts. The following quote comes from the Institute of Medicine, was featured in the movie Sicko, and indicates the severity of the US healthcare predicament.
According to the Institute of Medicine, “lack of health insurance causes roughly 18,000 unnecessary deaths every year in the United States. Although America leads the world in spending on health care, it is the only wealthy, industrialized nation that does not ensure that all citizens have coverage.” (“Insuring America’s Health: Principles and Recommendations”)
This is a scary number of people that die each year from the lack of financial means in the United States. With the institution of Universal Healthcare that number would be down to zero.
The scary facts about United States unusual healthcare system are that the United States Government is doing puny in the contrivance of making this number go down. Hillary Clinton, one of the biggest supporters of Universal Healthcare, was bought out by the drug companies and doctors in the develop of campaign money. She is the second highest recipient of money from the original healthcare system; thus causing a conundrum (Christensen). How can the government fix the modern quandary when the candidates themselves are in the pockets of the healthcare system and expansive drug manufacturers? Most belief it as a predicament, but do not know the extent of the problem; the healthcare companies are spending more and more money hiring people to fight congress over healthcare plans. In fact, there are 2,084 lobbyist and only 535 members of congress (Mayor).
The uninsured are a stout marginalized group in the United States that are not being represented by the government with adequate representation. The drug companies have the most to lose if the United States government adopts universal healthcare. They will lose the most because apt now they are making their fortune off the unique health insurance opinion in the United States. They manufacture their money off not treating everyone and from their high premiums. The fresh Bush administration has been urged by the drug companies to not agree to a universal healthcare system. They offer payouts to high political figures such as George W. Bush himself. This money is honest a part of the amount of money that these drug companies receive every year from American families.
The uninsured American has no contrivance to argue with the insurance or drug companies over how grand their care will cost them. To set it simply, they can’t. The following is a quote from Kuro5hin.org which posted this argument about bargaining rights of the uninsured:
“An individual who needs medical care has no bargaining power whatsoever with a hospital. He can either agree to pay whatever he is charged, or he can die. There are no other choices. In some cases, the government will force him to come by medical care – if he is a minor child in a family that does not wish to catch him any for religious or financial reasons, or if he is considered not to be in possession of reason – but he will level-headed be billed. Refusing medical care for a uncertain or fatal condition is something most people won’t do – and may, in fact, be considered evidence of insanity which takes away the patient’s legal to refuse treatment at all. He can’t inch out because the label seems unreasonable. In some cases negotiation is fruitful, but often it isn’t.”
This following scenario is a actual region that far too many Americans face who are uninsured. They have no arrangement to pay off their bill so they can only settle to refuse care instead, often doing this to wait on their families financially. Their bills often gather so high that if they chose to die, it would be better financially. So are we putting a mark on human life?
Terrified by the chilly shoulder that the U.S. Senate shows the uninsured, I looked into true life accounts of uninsured persons in the United States and their chilling stories. The following narrative touched me because it is of a hard working miner named Lenny who worked all his life in unforgiving conditions. He survived a mine fire which killed 91 of his co-workers. This didn’t conclude Lenny from returning to work, because after all he had three kids and with his job large health care. Unfortunately for Lenny he had health care up until the mine he worked for laid everyone off. This left Lenny with serious health problems from working underground for twenty years. He would eventually need medical care; so he applied for a job that offered medical assistance, and the only salvage was that it took 60 days to go into do. The following comes from (Sered and Fernandopulle):
“The luck that had made Lenny one of the survivor’s of the 1972 mine fire had bustle out. Only 30 days after he began the job, he fell down onto the pavement in burly cardiac arrest. Paramedics flew him to Spokane, Wash., to a cardiac unit. His recovery was far better than anyone expected, but he was saddled with gigantic medical bills. A year later, he was sent to the hospital for angioplasty and eventually open-heart surgery. The doctors saved his life, but Lenny is quiet suffering acute headaches as a result of falling to the pavement when he experienced the initial cardiac arrest. The cardiologist sent him to an otolaryngologist, who then sent him to other specialists for treatments; none has eliminated his headaches.
The bill for his various surgeries, consultations, medications, and treatments is more than $140,000—it might as well be $1 billion in terms of Lenny ever being able to pay it. His sole income at this time is the $400/month pension he receives from the mining company.
The second ending to Lenny’s yarn is a bit different. Speaking with feeling about the first time he had to ask for public assistance, tears reach into his eyes, which seems incongruous for a man who went succor down into the mine as soon as the smoke from the deadly fire had cleared out. “We have worked all of our lives, even went to work sick,” Lenny says. And now, instead of the dignity of automatic access to care, he depends on the golden heart of the county indigent assistance program.”
Lenny’s case is not an isolated one by any means; many people are uninsured and allotment similar stories about how the flaws of the original healthcare system.
Recently the blogging phenomenon has allowed many people with internet access to be able to part their healthcare stories with the world. Many people who can’t afford insurance can’t afford the cost of high race internet which is required in order to blog. However, many public libraries offer this service and this allows many to have a express when they wouldn’t previously. Healthinsuranceblog.com offers many different facts about the benefits of healthcare and what could happen if you don’t have it. The blog does not give steady life accounts of people who are uninsured, but they attend raise awareness of what it means to not have insurance. The blog brings up a obedient point about why Universal Healthcare in the United States is unlikely, we don’t have the money to provide healthcare for everyone. The government currently does not have the allocated funds to conceal insurance for everyone. With a tax it might be able to afford healthcare, but currently there is not enough money. Over 55% of the uninsured don’t pay taxes (healthinsuranceblog) and there would have to be higher taxes for everyone while only some people aid. Health Insurance Blog is a political blog that outlines what the upcoming presidential candidates encourage for health care.
Healthcare is often a matter of life and death for many. Without health insurance, the uninsured cannot afford routine doctors visits so if there is something dismal with them it is not detected until it’s too gradual. Most of the illness that people accumulate can be easily treated with capable care, but since most people fright the cost of a doctors or hospital visit they are left untreated.
Uninsured persons expend political candidates to assist net their message to the public about how well-known their situations are. On the website healthinsuranceblog.com the democratic author talked about how politicians are getting the public aware of what it is like to be uninsured:
“In the Democratic Party primaries of 1988, for example, candidate Michael Dukakis talked about a young single mother who had two jobs and calm could not afford medical insurance for herself and her children. In 1992, Bill Clinton did the same, changing the sage only slightly. This time it was the case of a woman with diabetes who could not score health insurance because of her chronic condition. And now, in the 2008 primaries, Hillary Rodham Clinton (whom I worked with on the White House Health Care Reform Task Force in 1993) describes a similar case. This time it is a single woman, with two daughters, who cannot pay her medical bills because her congenital heart defect makes it impossible for her to get medical insurance coverage. And Barack Obama describes similar cases, with the eloquence that characterizes all of his speeches. He frequently refers to his beget mother, who had cancer and had to anxiety not only about her illness but about paying her medical bills.”
Healthcare cannot wait worthy longer. Americans are dying every day because they can’t afford to go to secure a routine doctors visit or they can’t afford their medication. I looked at the earning of the CEO of GlaxoSmithKline which is one of the larger providers of health insurance, Jean-Pierre Garnier the CEO made $9.4 million dollars last year. How is it exquisite that many people in the United States are uninsured and can’t afford to salvage the attend they need, and the CEO’s of the companies that are denying them affordable healthcare are making a gargantuan salary. When people have to work two jobs honest to be able to afford to pay for their medications, why should insurance and drug companies continue to be making such a big profit?
Internet savvy users who happen to be uninsured illustrate their hardships over the internet. Oftentimes, people without healthcare who have problems have a hard time expressing their feelings about their situations because they either can’t afford to employ the internet or are too frustrated. The internet, along with blogs, has become a tool for people to suppose their conception without the censor of mainstream media. Blogs are written by people who have a scream and without an agenda (for the most fraction anyway; there are also corporate blogs).
Health care blogs are written by numerous people including, doctors, people without health insurance, and supporters of healthcare for everyone also known as universal healthcare. The commonwealthfund.org is an internet dwelling that describes stories of people without healthcare and their hardships. The station is made for people to acquire awareness of how terrible it is to not have healthcare, and even hurry down the stereotypes of people without health insurance. One stereotype I traditional to have is that people without health insurance are indolent, and or did not work hard enough to be able to afford it so it was be their fault for not having it. After looking at this space that gives minorities a scream, I learned that even college-educated men and woman have a hard time getting health care.
One profile on commonwealthfund.org was of a college graduate named Ryan who had to resolve whether or not to net a job based on income or healthcare. He was a healthy young individual who did not deem he would need healthcare so he decided to bewitch a job teaching which did not offer proper benefits. Ryan fell down on his apartment stairs and distress his knee, he now has very high hospital bills to pay off. He later had to steal a job that paid less but offers health benefits. Ryan ended up getting care for his knee in Chili because they did not charge as worthy and offered equal or better service. The quiz I have to ask after reading Ryan’s fable that he told was why should anyone have to determine between a career or a job that offers health benefits? What happened to what we were told as kids: “we can be anything we want to be? ” The truth is with our unusual notion many Americans are finding themselves working for adequate health service.
Blogs have become an edifying make of education for people who did not know about what is happening to the uninsured. With the unique popularity of blogs, many are using their train to disprove well-liked misconceptions about what is it like to not be fully covered by their insurance company when they need care. After reading all the Profiles of the uninsured on commonwealthfund.org I wanted to know more about how we could bag their stories across to more people. The upcoming election for president has given the most power to the uninsured. The biggest scrape that is being addressed besides the Iraq war is the topic of affordable healthcare for all. The fact is that healthcare is only affordable for the average American making under $50,000 for a family is one that is mostly covered by their employer. But with the economy falling without or slight growth since 2001 has not made it accessible for minute companies to provide healthcare for their employees.
Cramped business owners are finding it increasingly difficult to afford the cost of healthcare for employees. Exiguous businesses have to deal with high taxes by the government on their income (this number is usually around 35% but can very residence by station), this is a high number so the amount of funds left after paying for overhead is very runt. The goal of diminutive business it to expand and grow, but how can they afford to do that with all the costs they have? If healthcare cost less for business owners the economy would follow suit. It would grow, and I dare say we would be out of the recession that we are currently in. There is slight in accomplish of growth in the United States compared to other developing nations.
Universal Healthcare to many Americans is not indispensable to them because they are already covered; however I am concerned about it because the United States is doing so poorly economically. Blogs have been significant in addressing the assure of how great money in being spent by individuals every year. In 2003 1.3 trillion dollars was spent on healthcare by the American people. This is an alarming amount of money that is going to something that is under regulated as far as effect goes. The drug companies and insurance companies are taking a mammoth section of all Americans income each year. Healthcare blogs have played a enormous role in getting the public’s attention at this enlighten. They often do issues aware to us that we may not have known about; blogs unlike mainstream media are not censored and do not have a corporate sponsor. Americans who do not have health insurance acquire their stories about their hardships on blogs or others write about them on their behalf.
I found a family member in my family who did not have health insurance. I learned last year she had a major operation on her benefit, and I often wondered how she was going to pay for it. I conducted an interview with her and what I found out was disturbing. I have to say I am slightly bias towards this because she is a family member; however it does not effect the facts any less chilling.
My Aunt Lisa Herbert is a working class woman who did not conclude high school or abet any formal schooling after she dropped out. She got pregnant at the young age of 15 and had her first child at the age of 16. Lisa had a tough life from her teenage years. She had a hard time raising a kid at her age; she went through multiple husbands and boyfriends who would promise to grasp care of her children but left her financially ruined. Lisa’s legend regarding medical insurance starts two years ago in 2006. From all aspects she had a hard life but she wanted to unexcited earn something of herself, she got a job at a Dunkin Donuts as was promoted speedy to manager. She was enjoying for the first time in her life financial freedom even if it was small; she had the sense of independence. She went to work unprejudiced as she has always done one day in the winter; she fell on the ice leading up to the Dunkin Donuts she worked at. She fractured one her vertebras, however not life threatening, neither were her injuries threatening enough to compose her become a paraplegic. However she was smooth injured. Lisa could not saunter or be mobile for over 6 months; now imagine this as she described to me, she was finally becoming financially independent and was proud to become a manager, then after one accident she landed in the hospital. She did not have splendid insurance; she had what Dunkin Donuts provided for her. She was “lucky” in the sense that because she did not have the financial means to sue them. Dunkin Donuts gave her the pay for the 6 months that she was not working. She took this as a gift, but from my point of thought she could have got more out of them if she had money. Lisa then had to pay overwhelming medical bills (the trusty amount was not disclosed) that mounted on her already oppressed set.
Lisa’s sage is not an isolated one or even a rarity in the United States. Many workers who are working either retail or chain restaurants are not making it financially. The rising cost of healthcare that is not provided from the companies that they are working for is overwhelming and often times unaffordable. The blogging community is objective starting to occupy up issues of social injustice that is being done to marginalized groups such as the medically uninsured in the United States and giving them a notify. These groups should not be silenced because they do not have enough money to pay for profitable care or routine visits.
I want to address one critical disclose that the readers of this paper may be having; I have talked a lot about universal healthcare and how the uninsured need care as well. Many Americans that I have spoken to said that they don’t want heinous quality care if we decided to do universal healthcare. I have a personal sage I want to allotment to definite up any confusion with the quality of nonprofit hospitals or hospitals that offer free care. When I was the age of 15 I had a severe flat foot plight, with health insurance that covered nearly 99% of all medical bills my parents had to pay over $3,000 out of pocket for treatment in order to bag custom made orthotics for my feet and other care. They did not work. I ended up going to a hospital in Springfield Massachusetts that offered free orthopedic care to anyone under the age of 18; we did this only because all the “specialists” we visited did not encourage my condition. My doctor I had was the top orthopedic surgeon at the hospital and could rival any at a paying hospital. He suggested a recent treatment for my feet without surgery and gave me free orthotics that actually helped. My family had the money to score nearly any doctor that would aid me however this was the only doctor that knew what he was doing that we visited so far. He was composed paid but by donations (he drove a 7 series BMW so he was getting paid a lot). I judge that Americans that are opposing universal healthcare have a crooked thought on what it means to not have insurance pay for their care. I want to address one more thing, I found out about this hospital from a healthcare blog (can’t remember which one) which had other patients writing about their care and how they were helped by this hospital.
Universal healthcare to many is something that we want and strive for in America; but the inquire of we have to ask is can we afford it? A sight was done on the National Center for Political Analysis website outlining what would happen if we adopted universal healthcare today. According to the location if we were to see at another universal healthcare understanding such as Sweden’s, America would suffer far beyond what it is suffering today. Due to lower funding to hospitals through taxes instead of the healthcare providers, we would experience the following, a journey in unique staff for hospitals, reduction in staff at hospitals and clinics, reduction in beds at hospitals to house patients, undertrained people taking on higher responsibilities such as surgery (Larson,1). This makes it hard for us to reflect universal healthcare in America when there are so many negatives. However should the voices of the uninsured that are dying simply because they can’t afford their premiums be silenced?
Many of the uninsured living in America now are between the ages of 20-30, these by all means are young healthy individuals who feel like they will never need insurance until past the age of 30. They judge, what are the odds of getting sick? They are classified by the insurance agencies as “young invincibles” these are the people who do not have the average $3,000 a year to employ on health insurance let alone if their employer even offers it. Jake Hollner is by all rights a young healthy individual who at the age of 24 is working for Home Depot and is an artist portion time. He missed the insurance that Home Depot offers as it is only offered once a year in a two week time frame. He opinion to himself that he did not have the money to afford insurance (he was only making $6 an hour) so why bother? The money he would set aside from the insurance could be achieve to his medical bill if he had a onetime accident. He suffered from stomach ulcers since his undergraduate years in college, these ulcers honest starting coming succor so he decided to bite the bullet and go to the doctors for aid. He paid $200 for the visit and $73 for the prescription. This was his entire paycheck for the week but he was lovely accurate? The ulcers did not go away after he took his medication; he had to do the unthinkable for an uninsured person, he went to the emergency room. He lost his gamble with not having insurance he ended up paying a fortune for his ulcer coverage because he was without health insurance. The precise costs were not disclosed. Jake before the doctor visit could barely afford rent and other living expenses including health insurance (Amsden, 1).
There are other stories such as Jake’s out there, where young people who are rarely sick do not have the coverage they need in case of an emergency. The healthcare providers commented on this blog which Jake’s anecdote was on. They gave him a link to catch affordable healthcare through them, the provider is Blue Substandard Blue Shield. Even if there was “affordable” healthcare to many, how could someone like Jake who was only making $6 an hour be able to fix his other expenses? There is no cutting corners in his case, he has no money and is living on necessities.
With the institution of universal healthcare people such as Jake would not have to pay a lot to collect coverage since he does not do a lot. Why is it that in America the better off richer class doesn’t want to relieve everyone else? Universal healthcare redistributes the wealth that we are not getting a portion of. When the majority of our wealth is going to the 1/10 of the top 1% in our country how can the rest of us afford to live? In theory, their money would succor fund everyone else with healthcare from their taxes. Wouldn’t it be better to live in a community where everyone helps each other, and there is no one who has to determine between eating or taking their child to the doctor’s office?
Universal healthcare is a topic that cannot be ignored any longer. We have too many people living amongst us who simply cannot afford the absurd premiums that the insurance companies are charging. The people that are dying because they cannot afford regular doctors visits are exact people who have families and people that rely on them. This is a change that will need to be addressed as our novel president comes into office in the year.
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