My friend Wendy is DEAD: she couldn't buy broccoli

[ProSense]

My friend Wendy is DEAD: she couldn't buy broccoli

by freelancewoman

My friend Wendy ran through what her insurance company would pay for chemo, then ran through her own life savings, and another $10,000 from her mother.

However, it was ovarian cancer, which returns usually within three years -- Wendy got 5 years, but was considered uninsurable because of that "pre-existing condition."

After 15 years with the same firm, it folded, and the only work Wendy could get didn't offer group health insurance.

Because of circumstances too long to go through here, Wendy fell between the cracks: couldn't get chemo through an insurance company, wasn't poverty-stricken enough for government care.

But the doctors agreed: If she'd gotten the chemo in time, Wendy probably would have lived.

<...>

Here's yet another irony: Wendy had been a vegetarian since she was 16 -- she could, and did, buy broccoli by the truckload.

No matter a Supreme Court Judge's specious argument: what Wendy couldn't buy was healthcare in this country.

Fuck you, Scalia. Big time.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/31/1079555/--My-friend-Wendy-is-DEAD-she-couldn-t-buy-broccoli-

[Ilsa]

1. Our system of healthcare is deadly. nt

[Hawkowl]

2. Fat Tony and his crew

We do not have a democracy while Fat Tony and his crew of criminals are making the laws in this country.

Impeach, convict, imprison.

[CrispyQ]

3. +1

Impeach, convict, imprison.

[saras]

7. Mine used to rhyme, through the whole Bush admin - impeach, prosecute, convict, execute.

Impeach, prosecute, convict, execute. It's the law.
Broadcast it all with humorous commentary. It's entertainment.

[xtraxritical]

24. Here's a link to contact the Supremes.

They should be inundated with email IMHO. http://www.supremecourt.gov/contact/contactus.aspx

[JDPriestly]

38. I know someone whose cancer medication costs thousands of

dollars EVERY MONTH.

It keeps about 80% of those taking it alive.

That is the reality of cancer treatments. $100,000 will keep my friend alive maybe a couple of years if she doesn't pay rent or eat or buy bus passes.

A lot of Americans do not understand what it costs to have a serious illness in the US.

[unapatriciated]

66. It's the same for many who have autoimmune disorders also.

My son was diagnosed with Dermatomyositis in 1991. He didn't have cancer but he had to have chemo treatments to wipe out his immune system and then was on methotrexate, cyclosporine, pednisone (for more than ten years) not to mention a host of other medications that dealt with the side effects of those three drugs. Total cost of his monthly medications was over two grand a month. When I lost my job (and insurance) the second year into his illness, our story was much the same as the woman in the op and thousands of others. I went through my savings, sold my home and ran up the credit cards for his medications and physical therapy treatments. He went on my ex-husbands insurance but was not covered for his pre-existing condition. I started advocating for health care reform in the early 90's in California and thankfully they listened to me and many others. They passed reform legislation regarding pre-existing conditions and the Fair Claims Practice Act. Even with these laws and very good insurance coverage, long term diseases or cancer are still very costly.

We need to deal with the pharmaceutical companies as well as the insurance industry. One of the drugs I mentioned above (cyclosporine) has been around since the early 50's and still is very expensive. They did not have a generic form until the middle 90's.

Even with insurance, catastrophic long term illnesses will wipe out ever thing you own. It is a full time job just fighting your insurance company in regards to constant denial of claims.

Michael Moore's 'Sicko' exposed them for the evil they were. Yet we still gave them a seat at the table and allowed them to continue to feast upon our loved ones at their weakest most vulnerable moments.

[JDPriestly]

71. Thanks. I have been criticized greatly for mentioning the Edwards

name here, but I do recall that, during the primaries, Edwards warned that you cannot sit at the table with insurance companies and negotiate something good for the American people.

Obama, who had not yet tasted the bitter fruit of Republican obstructionism and cheating, thought he knew better. Huge mistake in my opinion.

Obama is a wonderful person as far as I can tell, but he sure was naive about the insurance companies -- and the Republicans.

[dkf]

4. Shouldn't the question be why you need insurance to get chemo?

Apparently she had assets.

Our Heathcare system is such a mess because it's too damned expensive and we require insurance in order to get access to it.

[freedom fighter jh]

10. +1 nt

[freshwest]

5. Should life be weighed blindly on the same scales as commerce?

We are failing as a country and a world when we put on our own blinders of fear and ego and ignore what is going on around us. People knew she needed help, but rationalized it away because they had theirs. Easy to go on thinking it's all a mystery and beyond our reasoning. It's not. There are no mysteries, just willful ignorance.

[dotymed]

6. I bet that she heard "I'll pray for you"

from people everyday. In 'Merica, that is our health care. It takes a bunch of sociopathic idiots to believe that is fair. They don't care about "fair" though, all they care about is themselves.

[Shadowflash]

20. yup.

[freshwest]

22. Oh, yes, the prayer dismissal, meaning not my problem. It's also used as a curse.

And I'm not talking about the individual's inability to pay for another's health care. It's the acceptance of the inequality in our country, and keeping others down.

The same ones who pull that line, love doing those charitable works. They know it won't get it done, and that will be God's doing, not theirs. It's the reason that faith and trust in that higher power can be a cop out. Because if we have no power really, we don't have to really change things, do we?

We're not responsible, it's all beyond our little minds. After all, we can't. 'We're just poor little sheep, who have gone astray.'

Horse manure.

I know Christians who spend time and effort on this and it's mainly ego-driven, but they won't admit it. It means lower taxes for them, and they still get to keep their position. An example would be some ladies I know who get together to feed the homeless.

Now mind you, the homeless have to leave their place to come to the church and get a meal. One meal only, can't be giving more, there are so many, you know?

And if they can't get there in time to be served for this once a month bonanza, they are in the wrong. Because there is chaos in the lives of the poor, they don't have vehicles to get themselves there, etc.

If they came and the food is gone before they arrived, though before the posted time for the meal to end, I asked, 'What then?' Their answer, 'They knew better.'

I asked, 'Well, if it's only one meal, and they have to pay bus fare or walk for miles, is it worth it?'

This idea was initially met with harrumphes, but then silence, as they also grumbled that the poor were not grateful for their labors, of which they complained mightily and patted each other profusely on the back.

I said, 'Perhaps if they had a house or a place to live and cook, you could be saved all of trouble.' You see, we are talking about doing 'works' that are their form of praying in public, which Jesus forbade. As usual my statement was about something obvious, but not fitting with the cozy feelings they wanted to enjoy.

To alleviate the situation in a just way, would require what progressives did in the past, providing housing. But we know what the problem with that is, because the media has told us all about it. 'Those people' in public housing, well, they don't behave properly.

In other words, since they are not being thrifty and hard-working enough to afford their own, their morals are suspect and their details must be made public for the public to look over and judge. Despite the reasons that they may not make the mark to own a home, they are forever in the wrong.

Part of the problem, as George Carlin stated, is the use of the term 'homelessness' instead of 'houselessness.' He said something like 'home' is an intangible term and I take that to mean, as he did, stop fooling around. Because the problem is tangible, fungible, whatever, and it's related to social class, property, and wealth. It's solvable, it's been solved before.

And since when do we as commoners, feel it useful to regurgitate the terms of those who call themselves, in complete opposite meaning, as that's a game they play, 'job creators, producers, and moral,' while they call the masses 'parasites, worthless mouths, immoral' etc.?

The media gets orgasmic about big donations from 'philanthropists,' but ignore the reason for the need:

Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy necessary. Martin Luther King, Jr.

[xtraxritical]

25. I think you wast too many words denigrating some ladies with good hearts and

not enough words on the real problem, no medicare for all.

[freshwest]

34. Thank you. But I'm not denigrating little ladies who get angry at the poor.

And you don't know who I know, and don't know how many times I've been involved in charity work. Until I finally realized it was avoiding the big problem and supporting the status quo, which is against Christ.

Because it really is a government problem, which those in my particular religion denigrate as oppressing them with taxes and regulation. And not only at the Sunday pulpit, but daily, okay?

Medicare for all won't solve houselessness and my comment was to someone about 'praying for you'. There is a certain bitterness that those who have been so dismissed and she was expressing that. I elaborated.

I'm saying my piece from my own experience and observations. If you are wanting to argue with the effectiveness of private charity vs. government aid, fine.

Otherwise, go in peace, and stop accusing me of denigrating you or anyone, because I'm not. It's not personal, it's an attitude and policy. Thanks.

[AuntEileen]

51. Your first post

I found your original post to be exactly right. I enjoyed reading it very much.

[freshwest]

55. Thanks. Things kinda disintegrated from there. We need to focus on the big picture.

[xtraxritical]

64. Not denigrating?

"I know Christians who spend time and effort on this and it's mainly ego-driven, but they won't admit it. It means lower taxes for them, and they still get to keep their position. An example would be some ladies I know who get together to feed the homeless."

[freshwest]

65. You are well named. You cherry pick my post to find fault and lash out. No go.

[davidthegnome]

67. Brilliant post

[SpartanDem]

8. The free market will solve everything.

[HeiressofBickworth]

44. Yes, yes, it will

in America the free market will solve the problem of over-population. As Mr. Grayson said, the plan is, get sick, die quick. Problem of healthcare solved along with over-population!

Do I need to add the sarcasm thingy?

[holy april fool]

9. ?????

The headline makes no sense to me. She could afford 10K in poison but not a plant? The problem is that when the cancer "comes back" it's because it never worked in the first place!


(Tip: eff the poison and stock up on chlorophyll...)

[drm604]

13. Read the article.

The title is sarcasm. According to the article, she was able to buy lots of broccoli.

The article says nothing about poison. Where are you getting that from?

The insurance money that she did get, along with her life savings, plus 10k from her mother, were spent on chemo that extended her life. The problem is that the money for that chemo ran out because she could no longer get insurance.

[MADem]

15. Don't waste your energy--that ass got his pizza after four scant posts. nt

[Morning Dew]

17. Du needs more chlorophyll

on the registration page.

Hello, goodbye.

[Jamaal510]

11. GOP: "If someone else pays for it, it is not a right".

[MannyGoldstein]

12. So if ACA is struck down as unconstitutional, do

you think that elected Democrats should fight like Hell for Medicare for All, favored by two-thirds of Americans and clearly constitutional?

[drm604]

14. I wish I could believe that they would.

Even if they did, with the current makeup of the legislature, the Republicans would just block them.

Maybe they could get it through somehow, but it would be very difficult.

We need to take back the House, and get enough of a majority in the Senate to prevent their filibusters. This, of course, is why they're trying to make it more difficult for people to vote.

[MannyGoldstein]

19. What harm would it be to... try?

Two-thirds of Americans want it. At best, only half of Americans want ACA.

If Americans don't get what two thirds of them want badly, they'll speak with their ballots.

[Shadowflash]

21. yup.

Get the vote on record of the rethuglicans voting down health care for every American. Pass or not at least we can say it was offered and there would be an official record of who denied it.

[drm604]

35. No harm at all.

I never said otherwise, just that it would be an uphill climb.

[quakerboy]

49. Just like they did last time?

If Americans do not get what 2/3'ds of them want, they will still vote for whichever corpratist they are presented who happens to at least superficially match their inclinations, as shown on TV, or their self identification.

They should try. The harm might be passing it. I think it is a big mistake to assume that our elected representation have the same goals we have. Be they Democrats or Republicans.

[freshwest]

23. Yep, that's the only solution. Easier to rag on the minority there, though...

[xtraxritical]

28. VOTE A STRAIGHT DEMOCRATIC BALLOT be happy and sane again!

You're so right. We must put overwhelming Democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate. We must keep the heat on the republifuckers for the next eight months so that women, minorities, students, young people et. al. don't get distracted by trivialities. Keep the pressure on!

[JDPriestly]

39. Yes.

[MsPithy]

16. "Fuck you, Scalia," is too polite.

But, come to think of it, I actually can't think of words disgusting enough to express my feelings to Scalia.

[xtraxritical]

29. Here's a link to contact the Supreme Court so you can tell them directly.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/contact/contactus.aspx

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

41. Scalia would probably respond by saying "quack, quack" again

which was his way of saying "fuck you, America" when he was asked if he would recuse himself from judging a case involving Dick Cheney after going on a duck hunting trip with the giant asshole.

[jimlup]

18. When I think about this it makes me so mad ...

I think of all things in our society this is what pisses me off the very most.

I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. I have also known of someone who died of cancer because she could not afford the treatment.

[xtraxritical]

32. I'm in the same situation as Wendy was.

I own my home but have no health (or life) insurance. I have to hang on for four more years to be eligible for medicare. If the worst should happen I will either have to sell or reverse mortgage our home which will put a huge burden on my wife's old age security. Congress has made it almost impossible for the average person to petition for bankruptcy, so that is hardly an option (except for those exceptional people - corporations). I'm so sorry for your loss and the awful circumstances our system forced Wendy to go thru. Here is a link to contact the Supreme Court, http://www.supremecourt.gov/contact/contactus.aspx , I hope they are inundated with emails demanding the ACA be the law of the land. There is nothing unconstitutional about it to even consider IMO. Much better would be Medicare for all. Vote these Right Wing nut cases out of office now - Vote A Straight Democratic Ballot!

[Ms. Toad]

48. If you are truly in Wendy's situation -

no health insurance and a pre-existing condition, there are options available before 2014.

The gist of the benefit of PCIP is that if you have a pre-existing condition which prevents you from getting health insurance on the open market - and you have been without insurance for 6 months - you can but health insurance through the high risk pools.

Here's a link with information: https://www.pcip.gov/StatePlans.html

The premiums range from slightly over $100/month to around $600 a month depending on the level fo coverage you need (they vary by state, and I checked several but not all states).

[Manifestor_of_Light]

62. I cannot afford it. I'm over 55 in Texas.

The only income I have is from a renthouse, after I pay taxes and insurance on two houses I don't have much left.

I'm already trying to figure out how to pay of a $30,000 hospital bill I owe from last November. it started thanksgiving night. I was hyperventilating and couldn't even walk, it was too much exertion, and not getting enough oxygen. went to the ER and had uncontrolled diabetes and blood clots in my lungs which would have killed me within 24 hours.

This was 8 days in ICU at a non-profit hospital. guess I'll have to pay a couple of hundred a month for years and years till I die.

[Ms. Toad]

63. Call the hospital and ask to speak with their financial counselor

Depending on your resources and income, there are typically programs to cover care for people who can't afford it (but they don't tend to make it obvious). If you are lucky, there will be a sentence or so about it on the bills that will give you a more specific clue as to where to start.

Bu as to the insurance - it isn't ideal, but it is a lot better than what was available pre HCRA. My daughter (21) would have been paying around $1500 a month, assuming she timed it perfectly and was able to enroll during open enrollment period. Under the PCIP plan, her premium would be $164. Given that her bills for the first two months of this year are > $8000, that's a pretty good deal. (She's covered under my insurance, at the moment, but until the HCRA, we were actively investigating how to cover her since she isn't able to be a full time student)

[libinnyandia]

26. When he goes before his judge, in a court much superior to his, he will have much to answer for.

[cyglet]

27. Quick trip to Canada

Where at least you'll be treated...

[girl gone mad]

57. Or Mexico, or India, or Thailand.

Someone should have told her. For less than the cost of her insurance premiums in the US, she could get complete care in many of these other places.

[Faygo Kid]

30. Scalia has all the empathy of his buddy Dick Cheney

Don't waste even a moment thinking that Scalia would care about this. He's just about the perfect Republican, and one of the worst justices in the history of the Supreme Court.

[jillan]

31. What gets me the most about all this is that we - the taxpayers - pay for the SCOTUS healthcare.

It's just not right that we have no choice to pay for theirs but they have every right to take away ours.

[julian09]

40. The supreme court is mandating us with insurance to pay for health care for those who don't have ins

We can always grow broccoli, borrow some, steal it from neighbors yard; if we can't afford to buy it. Can't do that with insurance, insurance is the currency with which to buy health CARE.
Broccolli isn't the only food source and cancer isn't the only disease but health insurance is the means to procure health CARE, be it an apple or broccoli, not every cure is the same. Collectively mandating us to subsidize the uninsured, who go to emergency room, rather than doctors office and state and fed employees through taxes, is just as much a mandate as an individual mandate.
If the medical profession is to treat the uninsured and indigent shouldn't patients be required to participate in the risk pool, lowering costs for everyone including themselves.

[indepat]

33. Fuck everyone having the mentality that GE should pay little/no Federal income taxes and the Mittens

should pay only 15% on an annual income of 20 million dollars, all the while many American are sick and needlessly dying because of lack of access to needed medical care. Fuck the whole lot of them and all those of their ilk.

[freshwest]

68. +1

[TheKentuckian]

36. We are far down the rabbithole that even the most emotional advocate

percieves the problem as being unable to "buy healthcare in this country" rather than this beloved friend having the RIGH to healthcare in this country.

The writer cannot escape the paradigm of life being a commodity any more than Scalia can, she just thinks that all of those who can afford it should be able to buy it. Scalia wants insurance only as a means for companies to extract money from "the small people" that are healthy mostly for the illusion of security and the writer wants the asserted purpose to actual, which means those with the means should get coverage, and coverage should translate to care.

Both arguments only vary in levels of insanity because both insist that we are discussing a rational market, when we are not and cannot be. No one knows what they need, what they want are for their needs to be met, and need will determine quantities.

We now have an argument where "the good guys" are almost as off track as "the bad guys" but are less callous and cruel on an individual by individual level but are just as commited to the underlying batshit crazy structures in the health system and both percieve healthcare as a commodity to profit from, and both insist that a predatory cartel be the gatekeeper for access to care.

The underlying commitment to the way we conduct these affairs is strong on both sides with each really wanting to make small adjustments one making it just a little more wild west to increase profits and reduce premium costs and the other essentially just wanting to have their money taken if they are without coverage.
The difference is indeed monumental, but neither is honest or engaged in undoing a set of problems that create huge amounts of entropy well beyond insurance markets or even healthcare.

No amount of money should be buying healthcare, it should be a right and anything that establishes a responsibility rather than a right isn't going in the correct heading.

[Fumesucker]

37. Well said..

Thank you for posting.

[julian09]

42. I agree should be a right

Single people pay as much as people with several kids and a wife. A young healthy guy doesn't realize that something can happen to change his life forever, an accident, sudden illness. Taking a chance that could ruin his life financially before it starts. Some people insurance cover their spouse health, so the spouse doesn't take the insurance deduction at her place of employment because she is covered by her husbands policy.
But don't hold your breath waiting for single payer, the private insurerers bought everyone off, that is why there were only 10 votes in senate out of a hundred for single payer, according to sen Burnie Sanders [dem Vt].

[Locrian]

43. very well said

And exactly why even when the right wing loses and appears to be insane they STILL WIN because they push to debate away from where it should be.

"No amount of money should be buying healthcare, it should be a right and anything that establishes a responsibility rather than a right isn't going in the correct heading."

[Chorophyll]

45. Barbaric. Goddammit. nt

[Initech]

46. Making health care a for profit industry was the biggest mistake we've ever made.

[SunSeeker]

47. K&R

[Sarah Ibarruri]

50. Scalia is a piece of shit. nt

[JEB]

52. I'm pretty sure

that is the official definition of Scalia.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

54. I would find it VERY difficult to call him Justice. I'd probably address him as "YOU" nt

[baseballguy2001]

53. NOBODY can buy time

The truth is, Steve Jobs is just as dead as Wendy. He had more money than anyone, and he was a vegaterian too. When it's your time, it's your time. No amount of health insurance or money will gain you any more time.

[haele]

56. But Steve Jobs was able to purchase additional time and quality of life - the OP's friend wasn't.

You might say that Steve Jobs was more important to society than Wendy was and was thus "more deserving" of additional time and quality of life, and the ability to pass down his assets, but Wendy didn't have the chance show if she might have been just as deserving - who knows what she might have been able to do, able to influence, if she was just given another five, or ten, or twenty years.

Having to buy health access means that the value and dignity of any one person, of their position in the universe, of their contributions and their very soul, is based on the amount of money they, their family, and their friends can accumulate - or to some people's view (and we know what brand of tea they drink...) - scam out of other's charitable wallets just for a few extra months of life- because if it's time for them to go, why should they fight it?
If you're poor and sick, die quickly so you don't saddle your heirs with debt.

A Calvinist doctrine, and now an Opus Dei doctrine, and it's just as much in service to Mammon as any other self-serving, opportunistic excuse to take what you want and the hell with the rest.

Haele

[freshwest]

69. +1

[baseballguy2001]

58. It's over

I never said she wasn't less important, I did say even with all his money, Mr. Jobs is still gone.

[ProSense]

59. You seem

"I never said she wasn't less important, I did say even with all his money, Mr. Jobs is still gone."

...extremely focused on money. It's not about money, it's about health care and life.

It's about this person's daughter: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002503209

It's about Santorum's daughter: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002381644

It's about Dick Cheney: http://election.democraticunderground.com/1002500085

No one, no country would have health care if the motto was: We're all going to die anyway.

[haele]

60. I'll try to be a bit more kind but the wording of your post did not come out well.

While it is true that no one lives forever, there is a lot of wiggle room as to when the body stops living.
The discussion brought by the OP was not "woe, my friend is dead", but "my friend couldn't afford to access the health care that would enable her to live another ten years with a quality of life."

For the discussion "my friend just died" the bringing the fact that Steve Jobs died even with his money and vegetarianism might be a bit crass to the person with a loss, but is a simple observation. A stark sentence - "when it's time for us to go, it's time for us to go." is one of the kinder comments I would expect for Dick Cheney, but I would definitely not expect the person who is grieving to deal kindly with that. It is not a comfort to those grieving, and it is not necessary for someone who is otherwise not in the public eye.
I have lost loved ones in my life - the "God's will" or "It was his/her time" comments always struck me as either cruel or patronizingly belittling.

But this was not the discussion. The discussion is that there was treatment available for Wendy, who tried to live a healthy lifestyle and did as much as she could to be healthy to extend her life. The problem was, she couldn't afford the same care Steve Jobs or someone's trust fund baby or trophy wife could that could extend life a bit more or make her able to function up to the end. Because she didn't have availability to the same amount of money, she was basically told she wasn't as important as Steve Jobs. Heck, she was told that once she spent all her hard-earned assets and those of people who loved her, she was basically expendable. Basically - spend all your money until you are homeless and live any additional time that would otherwise be available to you without comfort or dignity because you have the termanity to believe you should have the same quality of life as one of the top 1%.

Here's the real life example of this argument I have -
My father-in-law is wealthy. His current wife - a very nice woman, but she's still basically a professional wife who's life work has been to run fund-raisers and throw great parties - has a serious blood disorder she developed about 4 years ago. They were able to pay the additional money to get a solid diagnosis (around $200K plus insurance, from what I remember) and can afford the $50K a year or so they are spending out of pocket on top of their very good insurance to treat her at three different top quality medical centers.
She's expected to be able to survive comfortably for another twenty years or so because of that treatment.

If I had developed the same blood disorder she has when she did, the fact is that even with my company insurance, I would be dying right now while attmpting to continue to work full time (because my employer is good about that if you need to continue coverage) and raise a family while I was sick and weak just to keep that insurance and a paycheck coming in - and I would still be dead within 6 months. That is, if I hadn't already succumed to the stress and passed.
There's no way we would be able to afford the care to help me survive, and we'd just barely be able to afford the palliative care to keep me comfortable until "my time came". On top of that, my survivors would still be on the hook for my outstanding long-term medical bills - which would probably take a good third out of my life insurance that they would need to keep going after I'm gone.

Trust me, if Steve Jobs didn't have the money he did, he would have died 15 years before he did, because he couldn't purchase the attention he could with the money he had on hand.

That's the problem in a nutshell. In a system that dispenses quality of life by the amount of profit they can make off you, a good person without wealth who could be making a positive contribution to the world in general has no chance to have the same access that some lazy, pampered scion of a "Captain of Industry" can command.

The question becomes "what is a life worth?" If your access to health care and programs that can improve your length quality of life is based on the amount of money you can bring to the table, then your life is worth what you can buy, not what you could be or accomplish if you had a quality of life.

Americans stopped being Citizens once we became regularly known to Government as "Consumers". Even the term "Taxpayer" suggests that one's value as a Citizen is only worth what you can afford to give the government for your services.


Haele

[freshwest]

70. Excellent post. Thanks.

[Ken Burch]

61. Your friend was the sort of person the 1% wants left to die

And, unfortunately, she wasn't included in Fat Tony's notion of "the right to life".

My condolences.

We need to honor her, and all the others like her, by carrying on the fight for a system that doesn't treat access to healthcare as a privilege reserved for "our betters".

Don't mourn...organize!

[Romulox]

72. What percentage of Wendy's meager healthcare dollars does the insurance industry "Deserve"?

What percentage can we cut right off the top to give to the insurance corps before we give Wendy care? That's how insurance works.

[do the hustle]

73. We need to lose the conditioning which says that in order to enjoy perfect health

we must look outside ourselves. Invest in eating live foods, not denatured dead ones! A very good juicer with a long-term warranty can be had for $300! Investing in this real form of health/self care is the key!