My brother has finally received food after waiting seven days.  My quest has just begun.  Those that know me, know me for my passion of dignity, respect and compassion, for all people.  Those that know me, know I write words from my heart, as I believe them.  My words are the authentic me, and not mere words to fill a page.

I Have No Answers II

It confounds me that I live in the greatest country in the world: America.  I see the great citizens of this nation rushing to the aid of Haiti in a time of aching need.  I applaud their actions of pouring money and medical need to the Haitian people.  It is a laudable.  It is righteous.

Yet, here I sit in this great nation, and see first hand, many of our own citizens in dire need.  It seems that we can pour our hearts and money to other countries in need, yet we close our eyes, avert them down, to ignore our own.  Go ahead and squirm.

For now, I speak solely on health care;  not only the lack of health care for some, but the gross ineptitude of doling out the needs of those insured.  Do not mistake this for support for a new health care bill.  It is not that, but trying to open eyes. For, I will be the first to admit, I have no answers.  I know that what some people THINK they have for health insurance is in error.  The insured are simply a serious illness away from becoming uninsured.  It has become a fight to procure the services our insurance companies have promised.  We have become liabilities to their greed.

I have first hand knowledge on many fronts of our health care system.  My own cerebral aneurysm opened that can of worms.  It was the first I had heard the term UNINSURABLE.  Yet, I am fortunate to be one of the lucky ones, to have insurance that can never be canceled, through the military.  Otherwise, I would be like many others and uninsured, because as my numerous doctors explained to me then, a civilian insurance company would have dropped me.

I have watched my ailing parents fight for what they worked for in the form of Medicare, pinch pennies they no longer have to spare, their dignity gone, their hope for a better day, blighted by a system that no longer works, no longer serves.

I have held my cancer-ridden, supposedly insured brother’s hand, in a charity hospital that the insurance company suggested he go to, reducing the chemo-therapy treatments from $10,000 a treatment to $5,000.  Whom do you suppose is paying the extra $5,000?  Whom do you suppose is pocketing that same $5,000?  I watched in horror as the same insurance company fought covering his food, delaying that step seven days before finally doing what they were supposed to do.  The man that worked often 70 hours a week, payed his insurance, in the end has begged to be fed.

Another of my brothers, just recently laid off, unable to now afford insurance, now diagnosed with heart failure.  COBRA, you say?  Exactly how does an unemployed, sick person pay the impossible sum of $700 a month if he can not work?

I have walked the halls of many hospitals, and doctor’s offices in the last few months.  I hear the echoes of the same sad stories told over and over again.  It does not matter whether you have insurance.  The echo of footsteps retreating into the abyss.

You are simply a serious illness away.  These are but a few instances I have witnessed personally.  These are not isolated instances. It is happening. Now. Here. In America.

Again, I don’t know if public health care is the answer, perhaps one day, it will be the answer; but not in the current state of the entire health care system, too much is broken to sustain it.  Our lawmakers are out golfing now, it being the weekend, but that’s tomorrows post.

I wish you good health,

Jojoami


I Have No Answers II
23 January 2010, 6:10 pm
Source: The Ovum Office