Hello All-
I haven’t posted a diary here in a while but now is the time. The critical debate over universal healthcare is something I’m passionately involved with. My story has been used by HCAN in recent press conferences in my home state. First my story. A story that is fundamentally un American to me. More below...
First and foremost I support single payer. However I am realist. I see that the Congress is moving towards a competitor system of plans. We all know how essential a Medicare under 65 type govt plan is essential towards the reform progressives want: a backdoor to single payer. We need an alternative to the for profit insurance industry which destroys thousands of lives every year in America. In Rollcall Cong. Sheila Jackson Lee said it is a civil right that ALL Americans have access to a non profit govt insurance option. It is a civil right that you should not be a slave to your private insurer. You should not be bound by your employer’s choice of insurance. My story I think is an example as to why.
I am now 29. When I was 21 I began suffering terrible medical issues in college. Drs could not figure out what was wrong. I had private insurance via employer. In in fact I had many i.e. Aetna, Blue Cross (my fav-ugh) and others. Every week was another set of co-pays, deductibles, rx fees and premiums to be paid. I was charging on the credit cards, taking loans etc just to pay for week to week care-and I had "pretty good" insurance.
Once graduated I was bankrupt and indebted terribly. Then more fun and games. See employers don’t like folks with chronic conditions and once other employees catch wind of your issues often they push you out. It happened to me. Life was made such hell at work it made me sicker so I left. Another friend of mine at the same place has major surgery. And yep once the staff of this small workplace found out this person’s workload was made hell until he/she left. Such is the life in America in our current system.
Then I found myself spending all my days fighting the insurers over nothing. They wouldn’t pay for basic things. My diagnosis finally came in as Crohn’s disease. So my insurer promptly tried to dump me but was not successful as I retained counsel.
Senator Sherrod Brown said insurers are one step ahead of the sheriff. Always no matter regs you put in on them. Look at HIPAA. This law was to protect patient privacy. Guess what-it protects your insurers most the time. In fact my privacy has been violated outright so many times that I called my congressman on whom to report these breaches to. The answer-no one is enforcing the HIPAA laws. No one has been hired by our govt to do this.
See insurers gather your personal recs very often without you knowing. Once I was at a dr’s office out of town. He pulls a 200 page stacks of personal recs of mine. I asked where id you get that. He said -"well the clearinghouse." Huh? Turns out my insurer gathered all this on me to keep track and stores thousands of such records at a clearinghouse. I told my neighbor about this and they had the same thing happen to them. It never seems like
patients are ever protected by the companies or the govt.
So my story ends pretty badly. I had to file for disability. I needed good coverage and couldn’t pay medical bills or work. I’m grateful to be on Medicare and Medicaid. I wish all Americans could have that. On the downside to retain disability you really cannot work at all-the penalties are high. Here I am - a young man -broke and heartbroken. I feel the system failed on so many levels and the politicians of course seem eager to screw over so many good people on healthcare its beyond disgusting. Its dysfunctional governance.
So I make those calls to members of congress. I speak to key staffers. Policy advisors. At first I pushed for a Medicare style public option but realized this was not good enough. The responses were too cut and paste. So I urge al of you to push what Governor Dean is advocating-an open access govt plan available to ALL Americans regardless of what insurance their employer provides. The open access public option is the only way to go right now. Those 75pct in the polls who want a pub option want it to either opt into to get out of the web of private insurance for profit care or feel they’d like to have it as a failsafe.
President Obama has argued for a year now: if you have a plan you like you keep it. If you don’t have a plan you like you can change it. I think the public will be furious if an open access pub opt was not included. They would find out pretty fast that they have no way out of their employer based insurance plan while their neighbors can get into a batter option because they are self employed. I’m glad the House version pushes open access. If its some cordoned off plan like HELP proposed then I fear more will suffer my fate. They will go broke with their private insurance and have no way out. Yes the govt says it will regulate these insurers. But I don’t buy it anymore. Not after the hell I’ve lived.
There must be an open access public option for all of us. Let’s try to eliminate terrible tales such as mine.