Like most of those whose lives were upended by Hurricane Katrina, 52-year-old school bus driver Emanuel Wilson can thank the federal government for the fact that he has money to pay rent. He’s also been given food stamps to make sure he can buy groceries. And if he had young children, the government would almost certainly be helping them get back to school.
But what Wilson needs is chemotherapy, and that is something the government seems unable to help him with. Wilson was being treated with monthly chemo injections for his intestinal cancer before the hurricane.
He has been denied assistance largely because, before the storm, he had what the government says it wants every American to have: health insurance.
Under the present rules for Katrina victims, if you are destitute, the government will pay your medical bills. Ditto if you are severely disabled or have children. But if you’re an adult who had a job that included health benefits and you lost that job because of the storm, the government can’t seem to help.
That’s true even if, as with Wilson, there is every prospect that you can get your old job back as soon as things begin returning to normal.
“I went to Medicaid, and the lady I talked to let me know that Medicaid is mostly if you’re disabled or pregnant,” said Wilson, who fled New Orleans to Baton Rouge, La. “I don’t want to become disabled, and I don’t think I can become pregnant, so that leaves me out in the cold.”
Wilson can’t reinstate his health insurance — which expires at the end of this month — because the storm wiped out his job. The government says he doesn’t fall into any of the rigid eligibility categories for federally sponsored Medicaid.
While Washington debates, Wilson’s chances of getting the chemotherapy he needs from local medical providers may be slim, because much of the private and public financing for Louisiana’s healthcare system is drying up. Businesses shut down by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita don’t generate income to pay for employee health plans or state tax revenue to support public programs. Not only patients, but healthcare providers, face a precarious future.
In the Senate, a $9-billion bill with bipartisan support would help cover costs of healthcare in Louisiana, Mississippi and parts of Alabama. Childless adults with low incomes — like Wilson — could get Medicaid. Subsidies would help others maintain private coverage. Hospitals and other facilities could tap into an $800-million fund for hurricane costs.
But opposition by the administration has stalled the legislation. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said it would establish “a massive new federal program” and “a new Medicaid entitlement.”
Why do bureaucrats and politicians worry more about paperwork than need.
There are no constitutional rights for health care. Good luck trying to change that. As a German friend of mine once told me, we are capitalists, but you Americans have elevated it to a fanatical religion.
Do you think GM having $1500 in health care costs PER CAR helps the stock price? Why do you think Toyota plan on opening their new plant in Canada?? Cost of benefits. Health care costs are affecting EVERYBODY’s bottom line, because they are skyrocketing out of control.
It was time for national health care at least 30 years ago. Medicaid and Medicare are small steps towards that goal.
All of Western Europe, Canada, Australia, Japan, and New Zealand have national health care. All of Western Europe, Canada, Australia, Japan, and New Zealand have longer and better life expectancies than Americans. Is there something wrong with that picture?
Canadians spend about 10 % or GNP on health care, and everyone is covered. The United States spends more then 14% of GNP on health care and about 15 % of Americans have NO health insurance. Who gets the better deal?
My American Doctor has a person spending up to 30 hours a week just sending bills and trying to get payment from insurance companies. American Health Insurance companies spend up to 30 % of the overhead on staff. The Ontario Health Insurance Program spends about ½ %. Who is more efficient?
My father recently had a knee replacement in Ontario Canada. His cost was $2.00 Canadian; for the phone. Last year my wife had emergency surgery for a ruptured fallopian tube. Even after the Hospital discount and insurance, we are paying well over $1500 US. Enough said.
Health care in Canada is NOT free. Everyone pays for it with tax money. Some benefit more then others, but so they do as well with private insurance in the US.
Mike
Canadians, and most “Western Countries” have more freedom and liberty then Americans. Not to suggest they are all perfect, just freer from government intrusions.
In fact, freedom of the press is not only in the Canadian Constitution, it is upheld by the Courts.
Canadians have much less to fear about their government spying on them; the laws protect people from that excess.
Handguns are banned for civilians in Canada, because there is no use for them except to kill humans (their freedoms and liberty are co-respected). Long guns require a training course to help prevent accidents, thus protecting other hunter’s freedom and liberty.
While the US intends to require its citizens to all have a passport if they leave the country, Canada has no intention of following suit.
In Canada, for elections, enumerators visit every household to sign up voters, Americans need to register long before election day to vote.
When you get down to it, Americans live in one of the more repressive countries of the Western World. Better the Russia, but worse then Sweden, Norway, Germany, England, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Switzerland, Iceland, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and many other countries.
So Mike, care to suggest what Freedoms and Liberties rank so important to you that makes the abuse of ordinary Americans by Health Insurance companies so palatable?
Healthcare costs are up because…all the damn hospitals are owned by a very few “for profit” corporations. The focus is on the bottom line, not care, nor quality of care, NOR affordability. The health insurance companies are merging…so, now they control the market.
For a long, long time health insurance compaines only raised rates ont he “anniversary date”, then they changed longstanding contracts with customers (they send out scads and scads of changes, every month or so…some are very glossy, bound booklets of fine print) and started to raise rates without notice, whenever THEY felt like it. Our healthcare costs went up 70% in one year, without any real explaination, and certainly, nothing improved. Their explaination “we can do that if we need to”. Huh.
It’s a scam, folks. But, that’s just how it is….we are losing benefits and rights. We are losing jobs, and we are at the mercy of a government gone wrong.
So what are WE going to do about it?
Nobody is going to do anything about it. Nobody cares, everyone is too overworked to care and too tired to care and too uneducated to care or to realize they are being screwed over, or to do anything about it.
Oh and to that jerk who made the comment about healthcare not being in the consitution- i hope you get struck with a disease that causes you to have to sell your house and liquidate all assets because your insurance company sucks every penny they can get from you, and after you can’t afford to pay them anymore, they let you get on a federal plan until you just die, and after that happens maybe your kids or grandkids will think about how tragic it was that nobody would save their grandfather just because he didn’t have enough money, even if the technology is out there. No it may not be in the constitution but someone with healthcare and more money is not a better person than me, and they do not have a higher right to life than I do, which is why it is sad that someone with alot of money can be treated and someone without money is just left to die.
I don’t have isurance and I make too much money to get insurance from government, so if I get sick I am just screwed. When you don’t have insurance, no medical profession even wants to look in your direction. It is amazing how many doctors simply refuse to take a patient without insurance or give you a checkout and take your money just to tell you that they cannot help you. I think it is horrendously sad. We are such a selfish nation of fat slobs and we are all such slaves to our economy and government
Another unbelievable story from the US — regrettably, stories like that are no longer surprising. I heard that Florida just passed a law the permits the use of handguns in public places. From the outside it sure looks like you folks are headed back to the nineteenth century.
So why are all these people coming from Canada for health care?
China’s constitution offers all sorts of liberties as well, but that doesn’t make it so. Check out the free speech rules in Europe and elsewhere. Canada is issuing human rights cases against people for saying that homosexuality is a sin. Try saying in France that the Holocaust never happened. Have you heard of the name Oriana Fallucci?