| Subject: Re: Dramatic health care increases #2 |
Author:
Betty
|
[
Next Thread |
Previous Thread |
Next Message |
Previous Message
]
Date Posted: 07:10:13 04/04/05 Mon
In reply to:
Buffalo Betties
's message, "Dramatic health care increases drive americans to the poorhouse" on 06:54:14 04/04/05 Mon
I waited until now to talk about Terri Schiavo in hopes that the overwrought hand-wringers might have finally calmed down and turned their attention back to the business of buying big-screen TVs.
In truth, I have nothing to say about that poor family. It's their affair and should have remained so.
But I do have something to say about the larger issue, the one that the "human life is priceless" folks have been ignoring.
Guess what? Human life is not priceless. Not according to the federal government, which decides who gets what health care through its Medicaid and Medicare programs. And not according to your own insurer, which says yes or no to your requests for treatment.
And certainly not according to the 45 million Americans who have no health insurance because they live in a country that – ta da! – rations health care.
We don't like the "r" word. No one says "ration" out loud when it comes to health care. Instead, providers and insurers talk about "allocating scarce resources." Or "coverage limitations."
What they're really say, though, is you can't always get what you want, dear. You can have this doctor, but not that one. You can get generic, but not name brand. You can try this treatment, but not that one – even if it might save your life.
So human life is not priceless. Not by a long shot. Yet the Bush Republicans – the very ones who tried to make political hay out of the notion that human life is priceless even if the human is a vegetable – these same folks are attempting to gut the Medicaid budget.
What this means is that, not only do we ration health care, but we do it based on income.
Consider just a small example, one that might seem very minor, very unimportant. One of the benefits Bush wants stricken from the Medicaid program is podiatry care for the mentally ill.
Big deal, you might say. Maybe you don't want your tax dollars paying for some crazy person's bunions.
But you know what? The mentally ill are far more likely to have foot problems than you or I. You know why? They do a lot more walking.
Often, they can't afford a car or qualify for a license. So if a mentally ill person wants to get to the pay phone or buy some groceries or go to Friendship Club, it involves walking, often in cheap shoes. Bunions and corns? Too bad.
How mean is that? But it's easy to cut foot care for the mentally ill – who's going to carry protest signs? Just as it's easy to write a blank check for some poor, brain-dead woman – everyone cared about her, at least for the emotionally cheap moment.
But this country does not need a Terri's Law to keep us alive past all possible reason. We need a Common Sense Law, one that would do two things: a) acknowledge that we ration health care; and b) decide how it's to be done. Who gets what? On what basis?
Part of the debate should include a close look at that first issue. Yes, we ration health care, but do we have to? Can we all be Terri Schiavo, living forever and ever, as long as the feeding bags keep on coming?
If you've got a brain tumor and the only thing you believe will save you is a visit to a faith healer in Brazil, shouldn't your insurer pay for the trip? If human life is priceless, why not?
Why not, indeed? America is rich. We don't ration money for bombs, so why ration money for health? Why is it necessary to have a pancake breakfast at the firehouse because some cancer-stricken kid in the community needs an operation? There's never a need to carry a can door-to-door for a new Army missile.
But if we accept that we can't afford to give everyone everything, then we have to decide where to draw the line. Doing it willy-nilly, based on politics or poverty, is unfair, immoral and dangerous.
After all, we've got a president who wants to cut Medicaid benefits for the living even as he champions them for the brain-dead.
[
Next Thread |
Previous Thread |
Next Message |
Previous Message
]
| |
Feedback: 