News That Matters

This article was culled from the February 17, 2010 edition of News That Matters

Thanks to those who wrote asking about my health. The ancient plague is still here but the alternating baking soda poultices and hot packs have done what they’re supposed to do. Last evening I took a 500mg Keflex leftover from Acosta’s last visit to the vet. That seems to have broken the fever though I did wake this morning with a strange desire to have my belly rubbed. And I do apologize to my detractors, I’m not quite dead yet. I’m getting there, but not yet.

The reader who wrote, “you really should see a doctor,” and the other who insisted I visit the emergency room may have full employer paid health insurance or a spouse that does and so may not understand the actual costs involved nor the reticence to take on additional debt which is already crushing enough for so many of us. Rumor has it that Putnam County is working on a free-clinic, but for now, county government does not provide that service.

I’m just going to make the case that the current situation is not atypical even for those who carry insurance.

With many insurance policies the monthly cost is overwhelming, some are paying $1200 a month for family care, and the deductible so high that you may never see the “insurance” part of things kick in. That’s the gamble the insurance companies play on: You can get sick, but don’t get too sick! If there’s any money left over after you pay the monthly insurance bill you’re probably going to use it for the rent or food or your property tax bill. You are then forced to make a decision: do you manage along without adequate care for something that seems minor today so that you can pay your essential bills and not fall [further] behind, or do you seek medical assistance down the road when that “little nothing” turns into a Big Something and face the real possibility of being homeless, hungry, in debt for the rest of your life or, very possibly, all three?

And what of the cost of either decision on our national prosperity?

When you are sick and on the job your productivity is down which results in a decline in efficiency. When you are sick and cannot work, especially in a job without paid sick days, the local economy is affected. And what happens when you wait until you simply cannot go on and your illness has advanced? How much money is pulled from the economy then? What of your home and family? Will Verizon or Comcast or NYSEG understand when they don’t get paid because of the cost of dealing with an illness that might have been easily treated at the beginning but that has now gotten out of control? They might. But you’ll be sending smoke signals and watching a blank TV screen by candlelight.Will your town’s tax collector say, “No problem Mrs. Smith, pay us when you can”?

• John’s Hopkins reports that the loss of productivity from vision impairments alone (people who cannot afford eye exams or glasses) costs us $269 billion a year.
• Complications due to diabetes that wasn’t treated early on can lose an employee nearly 1/3 of his expected income during a normal working year.
• According to the Commonwealth Fund; “in 2003, an estimated 18 million adults ages 19 to 64 were not working and had a disability or chronic disease, or were not working because of health reasons. Sixty-nine million workers reported missing days due to illness, for a total of 407 million days of lost time at work. Fifty-five million workers reported a time when they were unable to concentrate at work because of their own illness or that of a family member, accounting for another 478 million days. Together, labor time lost due to health reasons represents lost economic output totaling $260 billion per year. Workers without paid time off to see a physician are more likely to report missing work or being unable to concentrate at their job.” [Emphasis, mine] Imagine if those workers had access to medical care they could genuinely afford early on?

We’re now at more than half a trillion dollars – per year – in lost revenue and productivity from inadequate medical care due to its expense.

“…because we have forgotten that in progressive societies, people take care of each other and that a healthy, well fed and adequately housed nation is one that is safe, secure and productive.”

This is the reality in America today; one that was not brought to us by Democrats or “liberals” or terrorists or immigrants or drug lords or pedophiles or whatever your make-believe-fear-of-the-moment-is. It’s a situation we’ve brought upon ourselves because we have forgotten that in progressive societies, people take care of each other and that a healthy, well fed and adequately housed nation is one that is safe, secure and productive.

We have been led to believe that the “market-place” will provide and that American style capitalism is the be all and end all of economic systems so we no longer need to be individually involved with the general welfare of our communities. That sink-or-swim is the only way. That somehow, providing universal basic necessities for ourselves and our neighbors is socialism. That if you can’t afford them you’re not working hard enough or you’re lazy and don’t deserve common assistance.

This is a sad state of affairs coming from a nation that overwhelmingly considers itself “a Christian nation” since Jesus, and I have it on the very best authority, would be mightily pissed off.

But there you have it. In the mightiest nation on earth, a nation that can afford to fight two endless wars, pump $700 billion into the Pentagon each year, that thinks nothing of handing over $1 trillion to the wealthiest of the wealthy, in that wondrous nation millions of people are suffering and a small but vocal minority is out there blaming the victims – and it’s that minority from whom we’re taking our national marching orders. In Washington, both national parties and the President are owned, hook-line-and-sinker by those who like things just the way they are and tea baggers seem to have drunk the cool-aid as well.

Nearly 45 million Americans have no health insurance whatsoever. An additional 25 million are under-insured and 62% of all personal bankruptcies are the direct result of medical bills. How many of you go month to month under the burden of your insurance payments, just getting by?

That is the state of the nation today.

If I end up in the emergency room for lack of early treatment, just wait until you get the bill for that… then multiply it by the millions upon millions of Americans who are in the same boat – and it could very well be any of you next. Just think: for most Americans that have insurance, you’re just a pink-slip away from where 60 million of your neighbors are today.

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