Another health care story

I wrote about my attorney with the back problem before. Today he got the okay for his back surgery, his diabetes is controlled enough for him to get the surgery. So now there is the issue of what hospital the insurance company will allow him to use (he can use any hospital he wants, obviously, as many will point out, but if he wants the insurance that he pays premiums on to pay, he has to let it choose). He was on hold for a nurse for about 20 minutes; then she said, no, the hospital your orthopaedist (who is in their "network" by the way) wants to use is not "preferred". So now he has to go to a hospital that isn't the one his doctor prefers, but the one the insurance company prefers.
When people criticize single payer universal health care they always want to say, "you won't be able to choose your doctor or hospital". Well, who has chosen my boss's doctor and hospital? Not the patient, not even the doctor, but the insurance company. When did they get to make these decisions for patients they haven't ever seen?
This has to change.

Stone Soup

I thought last night of a story I read as a child. There's a hobo, traveling through a village. He stops at house after house, asking for a bit of supper, and at every house the inhabitants tell him they don't have enough for themselves, much less enough to share. Finally he stops in a field and builds a cooking fire. He sets up his cookpot and puts in water, a stone, and some salt and pepper he carries in his knapsack.
As his water boils, he hums a little song to himself. Soon a villager stops by, and asks what is in the pot? I thought you were without food, why did you ask me for supper when you had food all along? Well, says the hobo, this is stone soup. It's really good, but with a little extra it would be even better. The villager suggests that he has some potatoes he could add, he will run and fetch them. Soon other villagers stop by and each adds something to the pot. Eventually the stone soup becomes a lovely pot of soup, and there is enough for everyone.

This isn't to advocate socialism. Whatever my utopian ideals, I am practical enough to realize that the human race could not make socialism work. And I admit it, I have stuff I really like too! But in some areas, when the good of the individual also is the good of society, as it is in the matter of health care, it is past time for some sort of collective approach.

Another day in paradise

I was reminded of this Phil Collins song by a young man today. And also today, I listened to a friend who is worried about her daughter. Her daughter is in her late teens, early twenties. She has type 1 diabetes, which of course means that nothing she did caused the disease; nothing she did could have prevented it. Partly because of the disease, she can't get health insurance easily. She doesn't have the kind of job that offers group coverage, and of course private insurance companies can pick and choose who they cover, and how much they charge. So she makes do as best she can. In a previous post I talked about my grandson, who is 8 and also has type 1 diabetes, so this friend of mine has been a source of information and comfort for me as I travel this path with my grandson. Anyway, my friend's daughter has MRSA in her thumb, and may lose it, and to hear her experiences of the last few days made me want to scream. And aside from the MRSA, her mother thinks she may be in ketoacidosis (look it up), which basically means her blood sugar is extremely, dangerously out of whack. And part of the reason this may be so is because those little strips she uses to check her blood sugar, which basically are just a means to deliver the blood to the meter, cost $1.50 EACH. And a person with type 1 diabetes (and I imagine also type 2) uses as many as 200 of those little strips per month (I know Adam checks his sugar level at least 5 times per day). That translates into over $200/month just to find out what her blood sugar level is, not including the necessary insulin to maintain it at a healthy level.
And with all this, the most ironic thing for me is that her mother votes republican as far as I know. What is wrong with this picture? My friend loves her child, yet I am sure she doesn't think there should be universal health care. I love her, and my heart breaks for her and for her child, and my vote, MY VOTE, will go to those who will make this better.