December 29, 2010 7:16 AM

Greetings from Third World America....

America’s health care system is second only to Japan… Canada, Sweden, Great Britain, … well all of Europe. But you can thank your lucky stars we don’t live in Paraguay!

  • Dan Castellaneta, The Simpsons

Yeah, teabaggers love to scream about a “government takeover” of our health care, or “death panels”, or whatever red herring they feel like making up as they go. They and those who think like them love to rail against government, and they contend that our health care system is good as it is…and it would be even better if government got out of the health care business altogether. Be forewarned, though: HANDS OFF OUR MEDICARE!! Don’t even get me started….

All the lies and propaganda aside, there is a very disturbing reality that no one- especially those on the Right- seem willing to acknowledge. That reality is that the number of Americans without health insurance is now in excess of 50 million- more than the population of Spain. More than half of all unemployed Americans have no health insurance. I’m one of the them, so in the interests of full disclosure, I’ll own up to the reality that this issue is personal.

Though many on the Right decried Alan Grayson’s portrayal of the Republican health care plan as hyperbolic and mean-spirited, their anger may have been due more to the fact that it was spot on:

  1. Don’t get sick.
  2. If you do get sick, die quickly.

Is this really what we’ve been reduced to? Are we saying that we’re OK with the idea of close to one of every six Americans being without health care insurance? Do we accept the idea that some deserve to suffer and perhaps die because the can’t afford health care? And doesn’t that sound an awful lot a recipe for a “death panel”, the very idea that so many screamers on the Right decried at full volume?


Aren’t we better than this? I’d like to say yes, but it would be a lie. This is not the America I learned about in school. The America I learned about was a country that accepted challenges and did what needed to be done. Now I find myself living in an America where those who have don’t give a flying (&^% about those who don’t have.

I got mine; you can damn well get your own…and, hey, if God meant you to have health care you’d have been born rich, capice??

Those lacking health coverage are vulnerable to what has become a commonplace financial calamity: confronting a medical emergency, and having to pay for care entirely out of pocket. …. Under the health reforms championed by President Obama, Medicaid is set to expand in 2014 to cover almost all people under 65 with incomes up to 138% of the federal poverty line. That would provide health care to many more Americans who now lack coverage. But until then, many Americans will continue to shoulder the burden of unaffordable health care costs.

The soaring number of people falling through the cracks and going without health insurance is in large part the result of the recession, which has eliminated millions of jobs, along with employer-sponsored coverage. Roughly half of all working age Americans with insurance have it through their employer.

Normally, I try not to personalize an issue, but I’m going to make an exception here. In this case, I can best illustrate my perspective on our Third World health care system by discussing the impact it has on me. As I’ve mentioned a time or two previously, I’m unemployed…and I have been since the end of January. This means I’ve been sans health care insurance for…well, a long time. This means living with the knowledge that if I have a medical emergency I’m…what’s the word I’m looking for?…oh, yeah…screwed. A severe bout of food poisoning in April cost me $190 after a trip to an urgent care facility…and I felt lucky to have avoided something even more expensive.


Two weeks ago, I was shooting baskets at my gym with my girlfriend when I tore a muscle in my calf. No, despite what you might think, I wasn’t showing off, but I’ve been hobbling around since. In my previous (i.e., employed) incarnation, I probably would have gone to an ER or and urgent care facility. I decided that I couldn’t afford to do that, so I’m left to hoping that it’s in fact just a muscle tear and not something worse- like say, damage to my Achilles tendon.

Monday night, I got a real scare. While watching Monday Night Football, the vision in my left eye became blurry in a way that I found very alarming. Making it worse was the knowledge that my father had a stroke when he was 53. I’m 50, and while I don’t have some of the same risk factors, I’m aware that biology can be and often is destiny. As my vision deteriorated and I became progressively more alarmed, I found myself once having to make decisions regarding my health based on financial considerations…and this time it seemed far more serious.

Fortunately, my vision cleared, and things appeared to return to normal. But what if that hadn’t been the case? What if there is a problem that I’m gambling isn’t a problem because I can’t afford the cost of treatment? What happens if ignoring what might in fact be a problem leads to a bigger and far more serious problem? I’m not trying to be an alarmist or a hypochondriac, but I do think my dilemma illustrates what so many Americans are facing these days. Because of those too selfish to look out for the welfare of anyone but themselves, more than 50 million Americans have no health care insurance coverage. Thus, we’re faced with making health care decisions for exactly the wrong reasons- financial ones.

We can fully fund two far-flung wars…yet cannot find it within ourselves to provide quality, affordable, and accessible health care for every American? We’ve honed, refined, and perfected the art of killing…and yet we refuse to guarantee access to technologies that can in some cases save the lives of our fellow Americans? Killing…good. Saving lives…not so much. Are we really so self-absorbed and selfish that we would deny our connection to, and responsibility for, those around us? What claim to humanity do we have if our driving philosophy is “I got mine; you can damn well get your own?”

I’m not looking for sympathy. My situation is what it is, and I’m frankly far better off than millions of others in this country…and for that I’m beyond grateful. Things could be so much worse…because for so many they are. The sad thing is that things could be so much better…but they’re not because so many of us don’t give a damn for anything or anyone outside of our own little sphere.

WE DESERVE BETTER.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on December 29, 2010 7:16 AM.

If I'm not Mr. Right, can I be Mr. Right Now? was the previous entry in this blog.

Some of us really ARE more equal is the next entry in this blog.

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