The War for Universal Healthcare Has Only Just Begun
Here are how I see the stakes in the next election. We, in Texas---and in a lot of other so called "Red" states--are still suffering from a massive uninsured problem. Take kids. We are supposed to have universal health coverage for kids, right? Not true. A state can offer Medicaid and SCHIP, but if it throws up barriers and makes the process all but impossible to navigate and tells inquiring parents "You don't qualify" over the phone when they really do, that state will not have universal coverage of kids. Texas is one of the states with shamefully high rates of qualified kids who lack coverage. Other red states are the same.
Then there are the millions who would have qualified for the Medicaid expansion---had the state not decided to "opt out"---an innocuous sounding little phrase which really means "let poor folks die and let the rural hospitals that serve them go out of business so that no one living in the country can get timely emergency care while residents of big cities continue to pay high taxes to fund healthcare for the poor but who cares about residents of Texas big cities they are all Democrats anyway?" Yes, that is what "opt out" really means---death to the rural poor and death to everyone who lives in the country who has an emergency---like the little girl who choked on a grape and was rushed to the local ER only to find that the local (rural) ER had closed so she died. What? You thought the GOP was the party of family values and lower taxes? Silly rabbit. In urban areas in red states, we are being taxed twice, once to pay for health care for our local uninsured and once to pay for everyone else's health care. Meaning it is not about the money. Red states love them some free federal money. It's about the possibility that some brown or black person might get a timely coronary stent and survive a heart attack. And as for the children---the GOP is only about family values if it is their own children. If the village plans to take care of someone else's kids, then the village is a commie-pinko plot that must go.
Speaking of the village, we know who believes in the power of villages. We know who is not afraid to stand up to tyrants abroad and capitalists at home when women and children are being victimized. That's right. Mom. Our next president needs to have a healthy dose of "mom" because the kids in this country need someone to raise them out of poverty and women need someone to make pay parity more than just a great sounding law. And no, you do not have to be a woman to possess inner "mom." You just have to believe in your heart that a village or state or country is only as healthy as its most unfortunate citizens. What does the Evil-anti-mom believe? That having a certain level of unemployment, a certain level of childhood poverty and a certain level of pay disparity is important in keeping the rich rich.
Oh, I almost forgot the folks who have ACA but can not afford to use it. That must be because everyone else has forgotten them, too. You remember that lifetime cap that was supposed to keep people from spiraling into endless debt because of a catastrophic illness? Guess what happens if you stick that cap up front as a deductible? People can no longer afford to use their ACA except in an emergency. And you might be surprised at how many people think that angina--chest pain---and mini strokes are not true emergencies. People with a $5000 deductible (and yes, there really are people out there with plans like that, even though some folks claim that they exist only in the same imaginary realm as the Easter Bunny) will refuse any and all testing/specialty evaluation and treatment if it costs more than a Band-Aid and a $4 prescription as long as they are capable of dragging themselves to work. By the time they can no longer drag themselves to work, it is often too late. ACA makes sure that the hospital gets paid for their end of life care, but it does not save lives. Well, I guess it does, in a way. It keeps the hospital open so that people who have better insurance will be able to use it for their own preventive care. But it does not cut down that pesky ER wait that can stretch to hours in a typical urban hospital, because so many uninsured and under-insured people still have to use the ER as their primary care doctor, since it is the only doc in town that does not demand payment at the time of service.
The ACA is failing folks with so called "expensive" diseases like HIV, too, by forcing them to pay more for medications they need in order to survive.
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-01-health-drug-coverage-discriminate.html
"Eliminating discrimination on the basis of preexisting conditions is one of the central features of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)," said Doug Jacobs, MD/MPH candidate at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and lead author of the study. "However, the use of formularies to increase costs and dissuade those with preexisting conditions such as HIV from enrolling in the plan threatens to at least partially undermine this goal of the ACA."
I saw something really scary for the first time last week. A woman with HIV who used to be on medications but has been off for a year, because she could not afford to see a doctor or buy her meds under her plan and now she is extremely ill. When is the last time that happened? I can't remember. I hope I never ever see it again. Please make sure that it never happens again. Please make giving ALL folks insurance that they can use a priority in the next election.
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