MY NEW HERO
Justin Bieber
“You guys are evil,” he told the magazine, out on February 18th. “Canada’s the best country in the world. We go to the doctor and we don’t need to worry about paying him, but here, your whole life, you’re broke because of medical bills. My bodyguard’s baby was premature, and now he has to pay for it. In Canada, if your baby’s premature, he stays in the hospital as long as he needs to, and then you go home.”
Sure, go ahead, demonize Justin Bieber if you must. I probably would myself, since I care nothing for his music or celebrity, or really anything else. Yes, he’s talented, and he deserves his success, but I’m celebrating him today for his refreshing honesty about America’s health care “system”. If you honestly believe that our health care “system” is the best, most advanced, and most humane system in the world…well, you’re either a Republican or a devotee of Ayn Rand…or both.
We live in arguably the most prosperous and powerful country in the world, and yet millions of us either cannot afford or are denied access to quality, affordable health care. The reality is that health care in America is based on the size of your bank account. If you’re wealthy enough, health care is not an issue. If you’re at the opposite end of the economic spectrum, it’s very likely a much different story.
I can speak to this using my own experience. I’ve been unemployed for 13 months. Sure, I had access to COBRA…but as anyone who has ever looked at COBRA can attest, it’s a ridiculously over-priced option. Yes, I could have had limited health care, but at a cost that would have drained my savings in short order. I, like millions of Americans in my situation, was faced with a choice: I could eat, pay my bills, and keep a roof over my head…or I could have health care insurance. Nice choice, eh? Millions of Americans like me face this choice every day…and most of make the only choice we can; you can’t eat health care, knowhutimean??
I go through every day knowing that if I have any sort of health emergency, I’m ruined…and yet I’d wager that most of those who argue against universal health care have insurance through their spouse or employer. I’m not saying that I or those like me are asking for charity; what I am saying is that it’s absolutely unconscionable that quality, affordable health care is not an absolute right guaranteed to ALL Americans.
An insurance broker helped me sort through the options. I settled on a high-deductible plan, and filled out the long application. I diligently listed the various minor complaints for which we had been seen over the years, knowing that these might turn up later and be a basis for revoking coverage if they were not disclosed.
Then the first letter arrived — denied. It never occurred to me that we would be denied! Yes, we had listed a bunch of minor ailments, but nothing serious. No cancer, no chronic diseases like asthma or diabetes, no hospital stays.
Why were we denied? What were these pre-existing conditions that put us into high-risk categories? For me, it was a corn on my toe for which my podiatrist had recommended an in-office procedure. My daughter was denied because she takes regular medication for a common teenage issue. My husband was denied because his ophthalmologist had identified a slow-growing cataract. Basically, if there is any possible procedure in your future, insurers will deny you.
Even if you’re able to afford the monthly premiums for health care insurance, good luck finding an insurer who will take you on. If you’ve had anything more serious than a hangnail, you can expect to be denied coverage for a pre-existing condition. Unless you’ve never been sick a day in your life, it can be exceedingly difficult to find coverage for an individual or family. Insurance is all about risk; insurance providers want to minimize risk so they can maximize profits. If you have any possibility of any sort of medical treatment or procedure in your future, that represents serious risk. After all, health insurance is not about paying for medical procedures; it’s about maximizing return on investment for those who hold stock in health care insurance providers.
Once you strip away the rhetoric and the propaganda, it’s difficult to escape the conclusion that our health care “system” has precious little to do with health care. Sure, we have some of the most amazing technology and treatment options of any country anywhere in the world. Honestly, though, what good is all of this wonderful technology if we don’t have access to it because we can’t afford it? What good does it do us if state-of-the-art treatment options are far beyond our ability to pay and insurers won’t cover them?
Argue however and whatever you want…but you can’t argue your way out of one very sad and serious reality- Justin Bieber is right. Our health care “system” really and truly “sucks”. Even worse, entrenched interests and their lobbyists have made it virtually impossible for this “system” to be changed. Sure, we may own Canada lock, stock, and hockey stick…but Canada’s single-payer system makes American health care “system” look like a Third World backwater…and it’s our own damned fault.
