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 relieve of the internet, minority groups have been able to rep 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 approach anyone anywhere at the bustle of light. Blogging is well-known 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 belief across without spending a lot of money. They have empowered and given a assure to, people without adequate health insurance, and will be able to befriend 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 sizable deal of effort for the average person living in the United States. The demand is whether or not health insurance is worth the amount of money they will have to employ or if they even have the money to exhaust on it. They then will search for at the opportunity cost; this is what they will have to give up if they don’t acquire health insurance. When struggling to compose this decision they often peep 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 veil a stout piece 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 beget only $48,201 per year.
The uninsured in the USA are a seemingly invisible group to political elite and law makers. The spot 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 notion limits how grand care they can receive. The documentary also includes what happens to people who live in countries who have universal healthcare. The documentary was an grievous 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 plight.
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 modern healthcare system are that the United States Government is doing shrimp in the map 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 originate of campaign money. She is the second highest recipient of money from the recent 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 enormous drug manufacturers? Most understanding it as a plight, 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 grand 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 factual now they are making their fortune off the modern health insurance conception in the United States. They get their money off not treating everyone and from their high premiums. The modern 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 share of the amount of money that these drug companies receive every year from American families.
The uninsured American has no blueprint to argue with the insurance or drug companies over how great their care will cost them. To effect 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 obtain medical care – if he is a minor child in a family that does not wish to rep 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 risky 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 lawful to refuse treatment at all. He can’t lag out because the mark seems unreasonable. In some cases negotiation is fruitful, but often it isn’t.”
This following scenario is a staunch dwelling that far too many Americans face who are uninsured. They have no arrangement to pay off their bill so they can only resolve to refuse care instead, often doing this to befriend their families financially. Their bills often glean so high that if they chose to die, it would be better financially. So are we putting a note on human life?
Frightened by the frigid shoulder that the U.S. Senate shows the uninsured, I looked into right life accounts of uninsured persons in the United States and their chilling stories. The following myth 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 halt Lenny from returning to work, because after all he had three kids and with his job expansive 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 rep 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 hasten out. Only 30 days after he began the job, he fell down onto the pavement in beefy 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 grand 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 unexcited 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 epic is a bit different. Speaking with feeling about the first time he had to ask for public assistance, tears advance 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 fragment similar stories about how the flaws of the recent 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 deny 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 valid life accounts of people who are uninsured, but they support raise awareness of what it means to not have insurance. The blog brings up a top-notch 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 camouflage 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 befriend. Health Insurance Blog is a political blog that outlines what the upcoming presidential candidates attend 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 infamous with them it is not detected until it’s too slack. Most of the illness that people come by can be easily treated with beneficial care, but since most people alarm the cost of a doctors or hospital visit they are left untreated.
Uninsured persons spend political candidates to attend acquire their message to the public about how necessary 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 glean 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 maintain mother, who had cancer and had to peril 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 regain 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 blooming that many people in the United States are uninsured and can’t afford to accumulate the encourage they need, and the CEO’s of the companies that are denying them affordable healthcare are making a enormous salary. When people have to work two jobs fair to be able to afford to pay for their medications, why should insurance and drug companies continue to be making such a astronomical 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 utilize the internet or are too frustrated. The internet, along with blogs, has become a tool for people to philosophize their view without the censor of mainstream media. Blogs are written by people who have a reveal and without an agenda (for the most piece 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 place that describes stories of people without healthcare and their hardships. The area is made for people to bag awareness of how dreadful it is to not have healthcare, and even scurry down the stereotypes of people without health insurance. One stereotype I faded to have is that people without health insurance are inactive, 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 state that gives minorities a boom, 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 acquire a job based on income or healthcare. He was a healthy young individual who did not believe he would need healthcare so he decided to buy a job teaching which did not offer qualified 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 assume 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 noteworthy and offered equal or better service. The quiz I have to ask after reading Ryan’s account that he told was why should anyone have to resolve 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 concept many Americans are finding themselves working for adequate health service.
Blogs have become an superior develop 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 impart to disprove favorite 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 come by 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 cramped growth since 2001 has not made it accessible for shrimp companies to provide healthcare for their employees.
Shrimp business owners are finding it increasingly difficult to afford the cost of healthcare for employees. Diminutive businesses have to deal with high taxes by the government on their income (this number is usually around 35% but can very site by station), this is a high number so the amount of funds left after paying for overhead is very dinky. 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 miniature in effect 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 convey 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 heed goes. The drug companies and insurance companies are taking a stout fraction of all Americans income each year. Healthcare blogs have played a ample role in getting the public’s attention at this affirm. 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 rep 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 manufacture the facts any less chilling.
My Aunt Lisa Herbert is a working class woman who did not achieve high school or befriend 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 recall care of her children but left her financially ruined. Lisa’s chronicle regarding medical insurance starts two years ago in 2006. From all aspects she had a hard life but she wanted to smooth do something of herself, she got a job at a Dunkin Donuts as was promoted hastily 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 design her become a paraplegic. However she was level-headed injured. Lisa could not go 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 great 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 idea she could have got more out of them if she had money. Lisa then had to pay overwhelming medical bills (the true amount was not disclosed) that mounted on her already oppressed region.
Lisa’s narrative 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 unprejudiced starting to rob 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 stutter. These groups should not be silenced because they do not have enough money to pay for first-rate care or routine visits.
I want to address one well-known jabber 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 putrid quality care if we decided to do universal healthcare. I have a personal fable I want to part to distinct 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 predicament, 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 gather 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 support 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 fresh treatment for my feet without surgery and gave me free orthotics that actually helped. My family had the money to collect nearly any doctor that would serve me however this was the only doctor that knew what he was doing that we visited so far. He was collected paid but by donations (he drove a 7 series BMW so he was getting paid a lot). I deem that Americans that are opposing universal healthcare have a curved notion 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 behold was done on the National Center for Political Analysis website outlining what would happen if we adopted universal healthcare today. According to the position if we were to search for 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 pace in original 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 judge 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 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 assign from the insurance could be set to his medical bill if he had a onetime accident. He suffered from stomach ulcers since his undergraduate years in college, these ulcers impartial starting coming aid so he decided to bite the bullet and go to the doctors for relieve. He paid $200 for the visit and $73 for the prescription. This was his entire paycheck for the week but he was handsome correct? 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 right 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 myth was on. They gave him a link to obtain affordable healthcare through them, the provider is Blue Execrable 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 earn coverage since he does not invent a lot. Why is it that in America the better off richer class doesn’t want to serve 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 back 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 settle 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 right people who have families and people that rely on them. This is a change that will need to be addressed as our unique 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 Space 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 Set 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 Station 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 Popular 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 Station Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
“Wanna play politics, kid? D.C. welcomes you to the immense leagues.” Modern Healthcare 37.41 (15 Oct. 2007): 36-36. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Status 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 serve of the internet, minority groups have been able to win public back 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 hasten 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 procure their conception across without spending a lot of money. They have empowered and given a exclaim to, people without adequate health insurance, and will be able to succor 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 exertion for the average person living in the United States. The expect is whether or not health insurance is worth the amount of money they will have to exhaust or if they even have the money to exhaust on it. They then will explore at the opportunity cost; this is what they will have to give up if they don’t occupy health insurance. When struggling to create this decision they often leer 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 cloak a great 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 create only $48,201 per year.
The uninsured in the USA are a seemingly invisible group to political elite and law makers. The predicament 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 notion limits how noteworthy care they can receive. The documentary also includes what happens to people who live in countries who have universal healthcare. The documentary was an obscene 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 spot.
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 modern healthcare system are that the United States Government is doing runt in the map 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 manufacture of campaign money. She is the second highest recipient of money from the unusual healthcare system; thus causing a conundrum (Christensen). How can the government fix the unusual plight when the candidates themselves are in the pockets of the healthcare system and big drug manufacturers? Most idea it as a plight, 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 gargantuan 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 factual now they are making their fortune off the fresh health insurance view in the United States. They construct their money off not treating everyone and from their high premiums. The new 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 objective a piece of the amount of money that these drug companies receive every year from American families.
The uninsured American has no plot to argue with the insurance or drug companies over how remarkable their care will cost them. To establish 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 net medical care – if he is a minor child in a family that does not wish to accumulate him any for religious or financial reasons, or if he is considered not to be in possession of reason – but he will detached be billed. Refusing medical care for a risky 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 glide out because the mark seems unreasonable. In some cases negotiation is fruitful, but often it isn’t.”
This following scenario is a steady station that far too many Americans face who are uninsured. They have no draw to pay off their bill so they can only settle to refuse care instead, often doing this to serve their families financially. Their bills often obtain so high that if they chose to die, it would be better financially. So are we putting a heed on human life?
Fearful by the chilly shoulder that the U.S. Senate shows the uninsured, I looked into dependable life accounts of uninsured persons in the United States and their chilling stories. The following memoir 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 tremendous 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 procure was that it took 60 days to go into accomplish. The following comes from (Sered and Fernandopulle):
“The luck that had made Lenny one of the survivor’s of the 1972 mine fire had hurry out. Only 30 days after he began the job, he fell down onto the pavement in fat 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 broad 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 peaceful 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 sage 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 wait on 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 fresh 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 rush internet which is required in order to blog. However, many public libraries offer this service and this allows many to have a screech 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 staunch life accounts of people who are uninsured, but they back raise awareness of what it means to not have insurance. The blog brings up a suited 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 screen 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 abet. Health Insurance Blog is a political blog that outlines what the upcoming presidential candidates back 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 unsuitable with them it is not detected until it’s too slow. Most of the illness that people collect can be easily treated with advantageous care, but since most people terror the cost of a doctors or hospital visit they are left untreated.
Uninsured persons exercise political candidates to back regain their message to the public about how principal 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 detached could not afford medical insurance for herself and her children. In 1992, Bill Clinton did the same, changing the legend only slightly. This time it was the case of a woman with diabetes who could not acquire 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 fill mother, who had cancer and had to concern 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 derive 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 regain the benefit they need, and the CEO’s of the companies that are denying them affordable healthcare are making a titanic 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 astronomical 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 consume the internet or are too frustrated. The internet, along with blogs, has become a tool for people to snarl their idea without the censor of mainstream media. Blogs are written by people who have a mutter and without an agenda (for the most piece 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 position that describes stories of people without healthcare and their hardships. The location is made for people to salvage awareness of how unpleasant it is to not have healthcare, and even meander down the stereotypes of people without health insurance. One stereotype I worn to have is that people without health insurance are slothful, 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 divulge, 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 secure a job based on income or healthcare. He was a healthy young individual who did not judge he would need healthcare so he decided to pick a job teaching which did not offer sterling benefits. Ryan fell down on his apartment stairs and pain his knee, he now has very high hospital bills to pay off. He later had to bewitch 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 mighty and offered equal or better service. The demand 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 unique conception many Americans are finding themselves working for adequate health service.
Blogs have become an favorable produce of education for people who did not know about what is happening to the uninsured. With the novel popularity of blogs, many are using their issue to disprove accepted 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 glean their stories across to more people. The upcoming election for president has given the most power to the uninsured. The biggest predicament 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 exiguous growth since 2001 has not made it accessible for puny companies to provide healthcare for their employees.
Exiguous business owners are finding it increasingly difficult to afford the cost of healthcare for employees. Dinky businesses have to deal with high taxes by the government on their income (this number is usually around 35% but can very spot by situation), this is a high number so the amount of funds left after paying for overhead is very microscopic. The goal of itsy-bitsy 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 limited in perform 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 essential in addressing the command of how worthy 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 astronomical section of all Americans income each year. Healthcare blogs have played a expansive role in getting the public’s attention at this screech. They often fabricate 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 serve, 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 construct the facts any less chilling.
My Aunt Lisa Herbert is a working class woman who did not effect high school or succor 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 steal care of her children but left her financially ruined. Lisa’s yarn regarding medical insurance starts two years ago in 2006. From all aspects she had a hard life but she wanted to quiet get something of herself, she got a job at a Dunkin Donuts as was promoted rapid 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 unbiased 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 effect her become a paraplegic. However she was collected injured. Lisa could not toddle 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 salubrious 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 idea 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 site.
Lisa’s chronicle 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 grasp 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 whine. These groups should not be silenced because they do not have enough money to pay for superior care or routine visits.
I want to address one considerable assert 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 obnoxious quality care if we decided to do universal healthcare. I have a personal fable I want to fragment to positive 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 scrape, 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 earn 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 unique treatment for my feet without surgery and gave me free orthotics that actually helped. My family had the money to accumulate nearly any doctor that would encourage me however this was the only doctor that knew what he was doing that we visited so far. He was calm paid but by donations (he drove a 7 series BMW so he was getting paid a lot). I assume that Americans that are opposing universal healthcare have a hooked opinion 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 request we have to ask is can we afford it? A scrutinize was done on the National Center for Political Analysis website outlining what would happen if we adopted universal healthcare today. According to the space if we were to peruse at another universal healthcare thought 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 hurry in original 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 assume 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 contemplate, 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 utilize 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 share time. He missed the insurance that Home Depot offers as it is only offered once a year in a two week time frame. He view 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 from the insurance could be keep 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 attend. He paid $200 for the visit and $73 for the prescription. This was his entire paycheck for the week but he was splendid correct? 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 genuine 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 sage was on. They gave him a link to regain affordable healthcare through them, the provider is Blue Nefarious 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 acquire coverage since he does not invent a lot. Why is it that in America the better off richer class doesn’t want to befriend everyone else? Universal healthcare redistributes the wealth that we are not getting a allotment 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 befriend 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 proper people who have families and people that rely on them. This is a change that will need to be addressed as our current 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 Location 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 Site 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 Area Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
Susan Sered and Rushika Fernandopulle, M.D. The Accepted 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 Space Library, Keene, NH. 26 February 2008. .
“Wanna play politics, kid? D.C. welcomes you to the astronomical leagues.” Modern Healthcare 37.41 (15 Oct. 2007): 36-36. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Keene Space Library, Keene, NH. 21 February 2008. .
Wattenberg, Ben. PBS. 2003. 12 4 2008 .
