Kicking a dying man - a tale of US 'care'

[depakid]

The day Barack Obama's health-care reform package passed, I received a letter telling me my seven-year-old son's American health insurance would be discontinued. I was sent the same ''termination'' letter three times, multiple pages of convoluted insurance-speak I had come to know well after living a decade in California.

I went to live in the US in 1999 for my American-born husband William to have treatment for a brain tumour. Over 10 years he had four brain surgeries, six weeks of radiation, numerous rounds of chemotherapy, immunotherapy and multiple prescription medications.

My husband may have been battling cancer, but the battle with the insurance companies proved just as sickening. Each time William had a brain surgery we would receive a bill - usually in the vicinity of $50,000-80,000 for the operation and three-day hospital stay - despite the fact we paid a hefty premium and the insurance company intended to pay costs.

I've heard often unsuspecting and unwell patients who are insured have paid hefty medical bills because they are vulnerable, confused, tired of being harassed by hospital billing departments or simply didn't understand the insurance jargon that the bill was the responsibility of the insurance company not the patient.

The day his doctors gave William the ''go home and die speech'' in 2005 we went home and within an hour the hospital billing department called, followed by his insurance company, disputing a $2000 bill for a brain scan in 2003 they claimed was not pre-approved by his insurer. It was.

I yelled down the phone to them both something along the lines of: leave us alone, let my 41-year-old husband spend some time with his son and die with some dignity, not on-hold on the phone to an insurance company mid-medical bill dispute.

William died peacefully at home a few months later. The calls from the insurance company stopped because the debt collectors took over. It was tempting in my grieving state to write them a cheque and be done with the harassment. Instead, I kept my husband's advice firmly in mind: ''don't pay them a cent.''

More: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/kicking-a-dying-man--a-tale-of-us-care-20100324-qwn4.html

Had the administration and congressional Dems told these sorts of stories over and over and over from the outset, we'd have had "a better outcome."

[Edweird]

1. I don't think the problem was a lack of awareness on the part of Congress.

I have come to believe that the outcome we have was predetermined. It seems obvious to me that the past year has been a dog and pony show. I am convinced the only debate was over who would take the heat for killing the PO. It turned out to be Pelosi.

Campaign finance reform will be the precursor to real healthcare reform.

[depakid]

2. The stories weren't meant for congress- but for the media and ultimately, for the people

who listened all spring and summer long to dry policy lists on the one side- and screaming teabaggers and corporate media propaganda on the other.

That's how Americans lost their chance at a robust public option- and why PhARMA's profits are STILL exempt from government purchasing power.