It can't go on. It must stop. Health care is making us sick.

I wrote about last year. We returned to the U.S. and had to get health insurance. There are three of us, myself, my partner and our daughter. We are in our 40's. Our daughter is 4. I have a 'pre-existing' condition of life-long hypertension (discovered when I was 18, thin and athletic :).

Our health insurance through the HMO we started in early 2002 was 428 a month.

Well, it has now officially doubled. The annual dreaded letter came from the HMO yesterday.

Our insurance will now cost 877 a month. That is a 21% increase over last year and a doubling in 5 years. We've had no health issues (other than medication for my hypertension), nothing new, no diseases, no emergency rooms, no nothing. Their letter said the increase was "normal operating cost increases."  They say that every year.

(there is a poll.. please take it... how much has your health insurance gone up in the last 5 years?)

That's 10,524 dollars a year if you don't want do the quick math.

Lets just say that is a HUGE hunk out of our income.

My company doesn't yet cover health insurance, but at this rate, what small business will ever be able to? I am over the proverbial barrel (not like a pre-existing condition will enamour insurance providers to offer us good insurance).

So, today I did a quick calculation.

If this rate continues, in 2020 our health insurance bill will be approximately 7,000 dollars.. a MONTH.  You know, that's 84,000 dollars a year.

At that point we'll be hard pressed to eat, have a roof over our heads or well.. anything.

There might be some point in the near future we'll have to move back to Germany (see why here: http://www.dailykos.com/... ). Not because of the political system here, not because we fear a gay-bashing environment, no, because eventually we won't be able to afford health care here at all.

Though I expect my income to rise over the years, if it doesn't rise drastically, we are are in for a problem.

Even then, if somehow we get rich or eventually have health insurance covered, we (as in the nation) are still in for a problem.

Can it it continue like this?!