Senator Obama says we'll have universal health care by the end of his first term.
Keep the year 2012 planted firmly in your brain as you read what follows.
2012 is a lifetime away for millions of Americans.
I haven't heard Senator Clinton address this critical issue. I don't know her healthcare timetable. Does she believe she can sign sweeping healthcare legislation into law long before the end of her first term? She needs to let us know.
But dear friends, to hear Senator Obama repeatedly make the pledge to enact healthcare reform by the end of his first term, has shaken me to my core.
Let me give you an idea of what 2012 looks like for underinsured (that's virtually all of us), and uninsured Americans.
THE UNINSURED CAN'T WAIT UNTIL 2012:
In an article entitled "Care Without Coverage: Too Little, Too Late," The Institute of Medicine reported that 18,000 Americans die every year directly because they are uninsuredand don't have access to basic healthcare.
By my calculation, this means pledging to enact healthcare reform by 2012 could condemn up to 72,000 Americans to death.
Some of you may begin to recognize the genius of John Edwards prescription for speedy passage of legislation. He argued that if the American people withdrew the Cadillac, heavily taxpayer subsidized Congressional health benefits, perhaps these freeloaders would recognize the urgency of working hand-in-hand with President Obama or President Clinton and would make the passage of healthcare reform the most urgent item on the legislative agenda.
THE UNDERINSURED AND FINANCIALLY TAPPED OUT - THAT'S THE REST OF US, ALSO CAN'T WAIT UNTIL 2012
But you know, none of this surprises me any longer. Not when the political class takes such good care of itself. This morning I read in the New York Times, that the New York State legislature wants to give itself a raise. Contained in the article waS this nugget.
Perks? They get free dental insurance, according to the Department of Civil Service, and most are enrolled in the Empire health insurance plan for state employees, in which the state pays 90 percent of the premium.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
That's me, I live in New York State, subsidizing them. You really don't know whether to laugh or cry.
So what about all the rest of us, the underinsured?
Well in another bit of journalistic derring do, the thoroughly out- of-touch-with-reality editorial page of the New York Times once again attempted to wax eloquent on the need for healthcare reform. The editorial contained the following ludicrous suggestion.
Growing Pains of Universal Coverage
The challenge ahead is to restrain the escalation of medical costs, hold premiums to single-digit increases and find new sources of revenue.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Well if the New York Times gets its way and my premium increases by 9%-- a single-digit increase, in a few more months, I'll be paying $8237.13, which would be $686.00 a month.
WE CAN'T WAIT:
We can't wait until 2012, we really can't. Millions of Americans cannot wait another five years.
Stop playing with us you damn fucking politicians. Yeah, I'm talking to the two of you. Both. Of. You.
Just askAlison Bass a resident of the great state of Massachusetts, if she can wait until 2012.
On Aug. 17, my 14-year-old son was kicked in the groin during a preseason soccer match. He could barely walk and was in considerable pain, his testicles having swollen beyond proportion. The urologist at our community hospital suggested an ultrasound to make sure there was no internal damage. Since it was late on a Friday afternoon, the doctor recommended that my son go to the hospital's emergency room for the scan. The results, fortunately, were benign and my son recovered quickly.
But a month later, the bills started flooding in: hundreds of dollars from the hospital ER, plus a few hundred more from several ER doctors and the urologist who treated my son. We also owed hundreds more for other medical services my family and I had used. On top of that, we still were obligated to pay hundreds to the orthodontist for my son's braces and several hundred dollars to podiatrists for services not covered by our plan.
By last fall, we owed nearly $3,000 in medical expenses. The bills had begun accumulating shortly after my husband, a social worker, switched jobs and we were forced to change health insurance from a local Blue Cross plan to a for-profit national plan. My husband was not offered a choice of health plans, and when we signed up it was not made clear that our deductible for the year would be $3,000 (for in-network expenses; $4,500 for out-of-network expenses).
Nor did we understand that once we met the deductible (i.e., spent $3,000 to $4,500 of our own money), we would then have to pay co-insurance: 15 percent of every in-network expense we incurred and 45 percent of any out-of-network expenses. Some Massachusetts residents who sign up for health insurance under the state's new plan will face even higher premiums and deductibles. Even some low-income residents who used to get free care will have to pay co-insurance charges that they may not be able to afford, according to Physicians for a National Health Program, which advocates for single-payer national health insurance.
It wasn't until my son's injury that we began to experience what it was like to be underinsured. As the bills piled up, I could only imagine how much worse it must be for the millions of those with less health coverage or none at all.
http://www.boston.com/...
Maybe it's time to let Senator Clinton and Senator Obama, that we can't wait.
I think it's also time to add WE CAN'T WAIT to YES WE CAN.