
Returning to America and the (Un)Affordable Care Act - djsumdog
http://fightthefuture.org/article/returning-to-america-and-the-unaffordable-care-act/
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taylodl
_The absolute poor have always had coverage in America, simply because they
cannot afford any doctors bills that are issued to them_

That is patently false. I have seen people die due to a lack of insurance.
Die. Dead. In America, because they couldn't get the treatment they needed.

I've also seen the difference in care provided to those with insurance and
those without. My own mother is a primary example. She fell down a set of
stairs at work and busted up her ankle really bad. This happened just after my
father had passed away and she wasn't yet eligible for Medicare. She couldn't
walk, there was an obvious infection setting in and she was in extreme pain.
The hospital's plan was to provide her a set of crutches, some pain killers
and send her on her way. Then they caught word it was going to be covered by
Workman's Comp. Once they verified the Workman's Comp claim number everything
changed. Suddenly they were treating the infection. Suddenly they realized
they needed to do surgery on the ankle or she'd likely never walk again (when
I said it was busted, it was really, really busted). So after the whole ordeal
was over my mom was asking a nurse about the difference in care when she
didn't have insurance and when she had a Workman's Comp claim to bill to. The
nurse told her point blank that by law they have to do the minimal treatment
for what's likely to kill you within 48 hours. The infection? Would have
likely turned to gangrene. They would have done an emergency amputation to
save her life (cheap and easy). The surgery? She likely would have never
walked again. Now she's fine like nothing ever happened.

While Obamacare certainly has its warts and we can debate what's needed to
replace it, please stop saying the poor have healthcare in America. The sad
reality is they don't.

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csharpminor
I've been lucky to have insurance since my first job out of college. I've been
lucky to have good health and have maybe visited the doctor five times in the
past five years.

Still, even in this best-case scenario, I've had three instances where I had
to fight my insurance or the care provider over whether or not they'll pay.

Case 1: I didn't use my insurance provider's confusing clinic finder correctly
(I entered the wrong group number) and was billed for being out of network.

Case 2: The clinic didn't submit my insurance information to a lab testing
vendor, and I was hit with a $900 bill for a simple blood test.

Case 3: My employer accidentally canceled my insurance when I was promoted to
a new role. I received a $1200 bill for doctor's visit.

Point being, this is the experience in a best-case scenario. I can't see a
better healthcare experience in the US that doesn't involve taking the
insurance and medical billing industries out of the picture.

Even if we don't go single payer for another three decades, I'd still like to
see price uniformity/transparency laws enacted that ensure medical providers
charge clearly advertised rates.

It's absurd that I can walk into a doctor's office, and not a single person
will be able to tell me what I'm about to pay up-front. It could by anything
from a $30 copay, to $1000+.

~~~
jcadam
I recently had trouble getting a ~$250/month asthma medication covered (you
can thank the EPA for making asthma medications unaffordable). I had to
basically act as the liason between my insurance company, the prescribing
doctor, and the pharmacy in order to get everyone in sync so the claim would
go through.

Oh, and there was one time when an ER visit for anaphylaxis turned into an
expensive lesson in medical claim coding. Apparently when an ER doc codes a
claim as 'allergic reaction' rather than the more specific 'anaphylaxis' it no
longer qualifies as an 'emergency' and my insurance company at the time only
fully covered ER visits that were bona-fide emergencies. Good luck tracking
down an ER doc at a hospital 2 months later and convincing him to resubmit
some paperwork (because doctors don't make mistakes) :(

~~~
alphabettsy
Not sure of what asthma drug you're talking about specifically, but many
medications that also changed the propellant have replacements with the same
or lower cost. So actually you can blame the drug manufacturer for gouging on
a simple reformulation.

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jhou2
Simply put, the US health care system has become a rent seeking system to
funnel wealth to the top 1%. When viewed in that way, Ryan's plan makes
perfect sense.

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r00fus
As GW Bush said, "it's an ownership society". Just that we're not the owners.

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usaphp
Health insurance costs are insanely high. I as a self employed am currently
paying 1200$ per month, for me, my wife and two little kids. And we have
bronze/silver plans so we still have to pay everytime we see a doctor and have
a high deductible.

~~~
callmeed
Mine went from $1,200 last year to $1,679 this year for me, my wife and 3
kids.

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jefurii
Apparently, if you have Taiwanese ancestry and a relative who owns property
there, you can apply for dual citizenship. Once you have that you are covered
under their national healthcare system. You still have to fly there to get
treatment, but if you have predictable medical expenses doing so makes
economic sense given our current fucked-up system.

Also, Taiwan's national healthcare system is modeled on the US's Medicare
system, it just covers the entire country.

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mikestew
_The number of bugs I encountered makes me question the security of the Health
Plan Finder website and whether it should even be trusted with my personal
information._

As a WA resident who used the site when it first opened, let me answer that
quandary for you: no, you should not trust the site with your information. If
for no other reason, because they'll mail you your password in plain text.

In addition to some of the most screwed password requirements I've ever seen,
there was also an off-by-one error in their password code. Meaning it would
take a (let's say) 21 char password, but would reject it when you tried to log
in. Because the password input was limited to 20 chars (or maybe they just
stored only 20 chars; remember, storing in plain text).

All of this is from when the site first went up, so maybe (hopefully) it's
been fixed.

 _The absolute poor have always had coverage in America, simply because they
cannot afford any doctors bills that are issued to them. Their debt is often
written off by hospitals._

Ignore this person, they speak from their anus on topics outside their
personal experience. It's not even worth rebutting.

