Morning all — how is everyone this morning?

Great, until I read this.

Hi Christy,

Hope you enjoyed your well-deserved break over the weekend.

What passes for health care in our country is nothing more than organized theft on the part of the health “insurance” companies. These companies make more money the more they deny coverage to people. And as you point out, those most in need of care are the most likely to be denied treatment. Imagine what kind of care could be delivered to everyone in the country if we cut out the insurance companies and just had the government as the single payer.

Will sanity and compassion ever win out? Not if the answer is insurance for everyone. My view of the entire insurance industry right now is very low.

Sorry — it’s really frustrating, isn’t it? One of the people featured in the Frontline documentary died of complications from lupus — which is what I have. It’s incredibly treatable and manageable so long as you catch it early and take the proper medication and get checked regularly and such to be certain you aren’t having kidney or other complications.

This woman died because she lost her health insurance through a job loss, and then couldn’t get proper preventative care. Makes me beyond pissed…

Oddly enough, sick. And very grateful for my employer-paid medical insurance, which will allow me to go to a doctor if my fever doesn’t come down today.

Public Health Policy in this country is insane. Single payer now!

So sorry you are ill, beth — feel better soon!

We had a fantastic weekend away, thanks. Didn’t realize how much Mr. ReddHedd and I needed it until we’d been gone for a few hours and had no one to worry about but ourselves. It was really nice.

Sorry to say it but Obama’s “health reform” will be half-assed because he is proving everyday he is nothing more than a reprsentative of the Chicago School of economics. Obama is proving to be the “compassionate conservative” that George Bush passed himself off as. Obama wants nothing more than to put a smiley face on corporatism. And they all lived happily ever after.

Until any legislation is a done deal, we still have an opportunity to push for something better. And then after it’s enacted, if it is? We still have the opportunity to push for something better.

And I refuse to just sit and take whatever’s handed to me. I’m stubborn that way, I guess. *G*

Good Morning Christy
I hope you got caught up on some rest.
A critical thinking person who cares about everyone would, in fact, imagine the effects of what would happen if we were hit with a pandemic disease and there were many without health insurance. Like you have. You continue to point to the really important concerns and I thank you.
Again I say, we are all connected.
Can someone come up with a morality booster shot to make us all care for each other? I know, that’s one of my crazy thoughts. And, it probably wouldn’t be covered by health insurance companies anyway.

If only there were more like you who are unwilling to settle for the scraps that fall off the banquet table of the elites. In the ongoing class war the elites are mounting their final mopping up operation.

Obama is proving to be the “compassionate conservative” that George Bush passed himself off as.

Wow, I hadn’t thought of it that way, but that description really fits. Sad, but true.

Good Morning Christy and Firedogs,

and then you have families like ours who happen to have medical coverage via an employer -

we have discussed dropping it for financial reasons – okay, that and the fact it isn’t worth sh* when we actually use it, but I suspect lots of american families are having that discussion. A roll of the healthcare dice, but at least it’ll make Chuck Todd happy

Having worked for a “non-profit” health insurance company, I have some idea about how unfair the system is. It’s just that much worse when it comes to the for-profits. Although Obama seems reluctant to face the wrath of the insurance industry- and will have an awful time getting good reforms with opposition coming from both Republicans and Blue Dogs- the only fair and workable system is a single payer one. Let the private companies process claims, as they do for Medicare, but don’t let them make policy or coverage decisions, please! Of course, people should be free to purchase supplemental coverage from them- but basic coverage should be available equally to all. By the way, as a person paying for her own insurance for seventeen years now, I can tell you I’ve become a little resentful of those with fully paid coverage – including vision and dental -who have no idea what the rest of us are paying.

That “morality booster” to make us care for one another is called democratic socialism but then Americans can’t have that now, can we? It’s so French.

My FIL has cutaneous Lupus. His kids both have issues related to his Lupus – my wife has RA, and my brother-in-law has a good deal of hearing loss. My wife and I have been very lucky that our employers offer very good health insurance. No pre-existing conditions clause. We both work in very cyclical industries, but usually, when hers is up, mine is down, and vice-versa, and neither of us has ever had an involuntary job loss. I hate to even think of what would happen if we were in that position. Both of our kids have respritory issues. If they were denied coverage, it would really do me in.

I would like to see a listing of all of the health insurance companies and what they are paying for what. For example BCBS is paying its state CEOs and CFOs over a million dollars each per annum. North Dakota, a very small state population wise, was paying
its CEO $866K. $1 out of every $3 being paid to these insurance companies never makes it to actually paying for health care. Time to get rid of the vultures.

I hear ya. We have our insurance through Mr. ReddHedd’s job. We’ve talked about him extending his working years if we cannot come up with a better solution for me in terms of health care because I was diagnosed with lupus right after I had The Peanut when I wasn’t working — and now finding individual insurance for me would be nearly impossible to afford. It’s a mess.

Sadly, I think insurane companies would not cover a compassion vaccine for some reason. *g*

In what universe does it make sense that the people who most need regular medical care are the ones least likely to get it?

What – you’re suggesting that insurance companies actually insure people? As in – *all* people – everyone?

“Health insurance is a privilege, not a right”. You have the inalienable right to get sick, die, and stop breathing the air of some seriously rich motherfuckers to whom you are nothing but a problem. If you can’t afford the insurance, then you are not a person thing worthy of consideration, as you are obviously not capable of contributing to the Great System of Paper Wealth.

Wasn’t the whole concept of health insurance concocted by a guy named Darwin?

Socialism? You dare use the S word? What are you? (Ha)
I believe there are a few people around this place who are unwilling to accept mediocrity. It’s why most of us are here. :)

Hi Christy

Here is Mass we are required by law to have health insurance. As a small business owner I pay my own premiums I make too much to receive a subsidy from the State. At this time I can only afford to insure myself my wife and 21 year old daughter are uninsured .
The insurance industry here in Mass has a lot of clout ,the only people really benefitting from this mandated coverage are the insurance companies.
I would welcome any change that would make my healthcare more affordable ,but I won’t hold my breath waiting !

Cha Cichka teen (hope I spelled that right my spanish is bad) Imagine all those fast food workers too sick too poor to take a sick day off who don’t wash their hands. If you believe the fast food hype your loss

One of the things that caught my eye about the Frontline documentary was this quote from the fellow who put it together:

“We have a system that doesn’t work. We have a business model that says you do well if you cover people who don’t make claims. But it’s meant to be a health care system, isn’t it? That is the paradox.”

That’s really the crux of the whole problem. Insurance companies make more money when they are in the business of not paying claims. But health care cannot be provided properly without paying claims. So the insureds lose while the insurers increasingly do not insure.

So we have a system that denies coverage to people because they need it.

I opened a digg on this post for folks if you want. Thanks!

I asked the Google what Senators pay for health care coverage.

here’s what I got . a quick glance through the non postal plans shows the most anyone would pay monthly for an entire family is $356.59. didn’t see a co-pay higher than $25.

oh, and there’s this from the handbook’s glossary:

Pre-existing Condition (FEHB, FEDVIP and FLTCIP) – A health condition that exists prior to enrolling in an insurance program. The FEHB Program and FEDVIP may not deny your enrollment based on you or your family member having a preexisting condition. FLTCIP may not deny approval of benefits for someone already enrolled based on a pre-existing condition.

note: FLTCIP is a long term care option

link

Sadly, I’m not exactly holding my breath either. I learned to save it for later fights a long time back…

Thanks for the heads up.

Mar. 31, 2009
As the worsening economy leads to massive job losses — potentially increasing the ranks of the tens of millions of Americans without health insurance — FRONTLINE travels the country examining the nation’s broken health care system and exploring the need for a fundamental overhaul. The scale of the problem now facing the Obama administration, FRONTLINE finds, is staggering, as lay-offs, major illness, and other unexpected life changes leave more and more Americans uninsured, underinsured or uninsurable. FRONTLINE also goes inside insurance companies to question executives on their policies, programs and priorities and examines the problems in one state’s attempts at health care reform

I think its primary mission is to deliver the corporativist message pre-emptively. The key operative term is “reform.”

We really don’t need to hear anymore about what the corporativists want. It’s time for further exploration and exposure of the kind Michael Moore achieved with Sicko.

We are in a world of hurt now. I cannot imagine what will happen when employers start to document every little item on a person’s job performance once they find out that said employee has a health issue and is costing the company $$$…This way they can layoff the individual and have the file to prove it was job performance, not health issues.

I recommend that employees keep a daily work log/diary of tasks and performance to document ones own performance daily.

My advice to people being laid off is to talk to one another and make sure there has not been any discrimination against individuals with health concerns being laid off in a block.

In what universe does it make sense that the people who most need regular medical care are the ones least likely to get it?

A conservative one.

One of the things one of the articles I linked above talks about is how there are companies that insurers pay to datamine information about various potential insureds. So they take medical records and other information and comb through it to see if you have any pre-existing condition that might cause you to either be uninsurable and/or have to pay a higher premium from the outset.

You’d think that HIPAA would contradict being able to do this, but it doesn’t. I wish I knew more about how ERISA and other laws protect insurance companies from suit, too — but it’s not my area of specialty. I’ll see if I can track someone down who does ERISA work who is willing to talk about legal action prohibitions with regard to insurers, though.

It does make an interesting contrast to a letter written to the New York times on their piece on a public insurance option by a rather alarmist (and ill informed) physician:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03…..ntemail1=y

“The unfair competition from a public plan would destroy the private health insurance industry. The inevitable result would be the rationing and other horrors of a Canadian-style single-payer system, which most Americans neither wish nor deserve.”

Rationing, in America! God forbid.

Because so many Americans aren’t dealing with rationing of all sorts now? We just call it “social Darwinism.” And hope we’re on the posh side of the country club fence, I suppose.

One can only imagine the outcome of this battle having been won back in early post WW2 era.

With the national mobilization winding down and Americans coming off a patriotic high and with trendlines of new families growing alongside new suburbs and communities the time was surely then for American National Single Pay Healthcare to come into being.

Of course Truman ran into a range of turbid politics that enabled the GOPers to ascend to power in Congress and the Red Scare that fully empowered the M-I-C which is still pulling
Americans down today.

It is certain unless President Obama is forced into a tight corner politically within this first year of being in the WH the private healthcare/for profit insurance lobby will do all it can to thwart American Universal Single Payer HealthCare plan and formation.

It is central to any political attack on current American healthcare “systems” to go after the “for profit” component. Morally it is without defense. Any politician who wants to promote and protect “for profit” healthcare motives and the debris field “for profit” leaves all over America today for far too many Americans will be demonstrating the worst of craven,immoral behavior.

It then becomes damnably un-Christian like as well hence shaming the “christian” types in WashingtonDC into doing what is long overdue.

Compel WashingtonDC to finally do what is morally right.

Here is what gets me. Every time this issue is brought up conservatives talk about how taxes will need to be raised.
Well, OK, but I am already imposing a ‘tax’ on my business by paying roughly $12000 per
employee for health insurance. Now, to get this load off my back, I am more than willing to pay higher taxes and my employees a higher wage.

Gee if only the investment banks and insurers were so risk averse in the financial world!

“Raioning” is nothing more than a canard that is skillfully used by the insurance companies, their lackies and the corporate media. Take a poll in Canada, Great Britain and France and ask if they would want to trade their health care system for the American model.

Sadly, I think insurane companies would not cover a compassion vaccine for some reason.

they could cover it for themselves. No pre-existing condition there….

Dugg, with a bug. I think I’ve got the flu. My sonnyboy has been sick for several days and I’ve been doing the hand holding. Home made chicky soup and all. This thing seems to take a while to go away, from what I’ve heard from others infected. Looks like another trip to the video store is on today’s to do list.
And, my husband’s out of town and it’s my b-day. Not fair. Not fair. (Sorry, I try not to complain here.)

Happy birthday! Hope you are feeling better soon…

A family member who is self-employed joined a health care co-op. Members submit their medical bills to the co-op and members submit cash donations to cover one another. Basically, it is paying cash for healthcare, in a self-made single payer program. Their biggest challenge is finding docs who will accept cash for services provided.

Members also agree to send cards to one another letting each other know they are being thought of as they go through any health challenges.

In a conversation with a doctor who is advocating for PNHP (single payer, universal), I asked: “What is it going to take before we get to this point.” He shook his head slowly, and told me . . . not until we’ve tried a bunch of half-measure alternatives (insurance-for-all), and find they come up short.”

Btw, no one has fixed the reply issue here, yet. That’s pretty pathetic. At the moment I would like to reply to a comment by oldgold and the options is not there.

The thing is the revenue is there for single-payer health care if the government weren’t siphoning it off to war profiteers and a bloated war department. And Obama agenda doesn’t seem to entail rectifiying any of that!

Don’t you always wonder when that gets brought up in quite that way how many of the people pimping it out have ever actually tried to pay for insurance for employees? Or tried and failed to find policies that they and their employees could actually afford in the first place?

If you just refresh your page, the reply button is there. No idea why it’s in and out like that, but I’m told it’s being worked on — since I’m an utter computer-moron, I can’t help beyond that.

The other talking point is “Do you want some government bureaucrat making your health care decisions for you, or do you want your doctor to make them?” Of course, now, an insurance company bureaucrat with a financial incentive to deny coverage is making your health care decisions for you.

We have a system that has as its business model, the denial of health care. My daughter had thyroid cancer and it was removed. Several months later she developed a bunch of lumps in the area of the surgery. The doctors wanted to perform some tests and the ins. co denied them. It took four months of arguing with the insurance co. to get authorization. My daughter was able to get this expidited service because my daughter, a critical care RN in the hospital, had the physicians personally arguing in her behalf. My daughters insurance is the highly toughted govt. system thru my SIL who is a GS15. These insurance clowns then have the audacity to claim that if we had a system like Canada we would have to Wait for health care. Give me a break.

Happy B-day, demi!

I’m pretty sure all birthday celebrations are automatically continued for a week or so if the b-day girl is sick.

Who luvs ya?

Why are we such a short-sighted, half-assed people, do you think? I get that sort of response — and not just on health care — all the time when I try and talk long-term, in-depth reform. And I never understand it.

And that’s just working out AWESOME for all of us, isn’t it? *G*

A refresh always brings back the reply button for me. It’s a pretty small issue on my list. *g*

But…but…Canada and Britain are scary.

I’d suggested a fix a while back.

Happy birthday! I’m with jayt: just pick a day later when you feel better and hubby is in town and then have a day just for you.

Yes, I know. But we also have to pay people to fix things — it’s not free. And it’s not an immediately needed fix either — because its manageable at the moment until we can get a batch of stuff done. We don’t have an unlimited, enormous budget to work with — nor do we have some sugar-daddy wingnut welfare budget.

But it’s on the list of things to be fixed during the next go around, I’m told, so if we can all be patient, that would be swell. I can’t fix it myself — no one wants me coming close to any code anywhere. Trust me on that. Teaching myself rudimentary HTML is about as far as it goes for me.

Responding to Christy at 24, I had a conversation with the CEO about this very issue, what business are we in? I insisted it was health care, he insisted it was insurance – which means charge as much as you can and pay as little as you can. Klynn at 42 describes a health care co-op. Believe it or not, that was how the first Blue Cross Plans came into existence. Things have changed so dramatically since then- especially because as someone else noted – the CEOs wanted to see themselves as “playahs” making big bucks and completely lost sight of the companies’ original mission

Ah demi, happy birthday, despite the germs!

Hang in there.

We’ve have the flu going through our house for weeks. It started in mid-Feb and has taken its’ time to travel between family members. About a two week flu and 7 day incubation.

Ugh — I think we had that same flu here, too.

That’s a scary story. How awful. I hope she’s okay now.
I think we all have terrible hospital stories, or knows someone who has. After my second child was born, I had some complications but they sent me home anyway. It wasn’t until I was hemoraging that they finally dealt with me.

One of the real problems is that the policy makers [Congress] have Cadillac Lexus health insurance. They live in a different world.

Not as scary as France! Oh the horror!

It’s important to make the point that they really are bureaucracies of the worst sort, insurance companies. There are so many players involved, the confusion is enormous. Whole industries have been created out the health insurance bureaucracy.

Happy Birthday and hoping you have a wonderful belated birthday when hubby returns.

you know, here is the main reason for “universal health insurance”

when everyone is covered from birth, that means everyone payed from birth for their health insurance

that makes it impossible to deny for “pre-existing” problems since the pool is funded by those who payed while nothing was wrong with them

and the law needs to reflect that once we do get universal coverage.

I like to point out the following, it’s a point that is missed by most in discussion;

the very purpose of profit model health care is profit, they are in the business of denying claims

the very purpose of government health care is accepting claims

the reason is the fact that the government gets a positive return when a they bring a person back to productivity, the private company sees no return bringing a person back to productivity

the government is in it for the long haul, the private industry is in it for this quarter’s profit performance

Happy Birthday Demi! Wanna dance?

See my 48

For demi!

That’s one of the things that I find so discouraging as the COngress becomes increasingly affluent in terms of composition. It takes so much money to run for office that a lot of folks are a part of “the bored millionaires club,” folks who think of elected office as something to do after they’ve cashed in on something else in their lives. Or who are using trust fund or other cash to run for office.

A lot of them are nice folks — some of them even take that wealth as a responsibility to do for others who don’t have it. But not all of them.

Without a diversity of experience, how can some of these folks possibly know how the other half lives or tries to scrape by? The same for staffers. Kids who get a job on the Hill out of college often do so because their families can afford for them to — it’s expensive to live in DC and you don’t get paid much as a low-level staffer. So you get that same set of folks working in the offices, and so do you then get a sort of bubble of life experience on which to draw for policy questions?

I do wonder about that quite a bit. Because I’ve heard it from staffers and lawmakers alike on how homogenous things can become under those circumstances.

Whole industries have been created out the health insurance Vulture bureaucracy.

fixed it for you

I am lucky I had breast cancer because it made me eligible for medi-cal in California. And I have needed it for other problems. Ron has no insurance but does have a good doctor. We are getting divorced so he can qualify for more care. The divorce will make him poorer.

What a strange world we live in. I saw the American Dream around here somewhere.

Thanks to all of you on the b-day wishes. I feel better already. In a virtual, theoretical way.
I guess I better not go to the gym today. Books, movies and monopoly. Could be worse.
And liquids. I’ve heard lemon in water is good for the immune system, but does it help once a person is already sick?

Oh mary, how rough for both of you. Hugs, hon.

Hope I don’t get ‘dinged’ for this, but if you ever need a load of rationing stories to blow someone away, please try this (I try to keep track of all this stuff):
http://cmhmd.blogspot.com/sear…..lth%20Care

Cheers,

Anent #54:

You shouldn’t have to pay anyone to fix the issue. Just by pulling up the source you can see the issue. It comes and goes, as you noted. In the current instance for me, it’s gone within the last ten comments. The source shows that all those comments are missing. That is an important clue to the issue.

Btw, mentioning “HTML” shows your age! :P

Wishing you a speedy recovery and a Happy Birthday.

Hey, that link @ 68 is for anyone else who needs a smile…

btw, Jane’s up with some G-20 news…

We had to marvel at the “wait” argument while it took four months of arguing and appealing to get my son’s surgery, which the doctor deemed medically necessary. They have all sorts of catch phrases, such as they aren’t giving medical advice as we can still go ahead and have the surgery, but they wouldn’t cover it because their advisor said it wasn’t medically necessary. The surgery was to correct a structural breathing problem. They wanted more conservative treatment, but wouldn’t define what that was. The doctor took them on on our behalf.

I understand why some cancer patients have taken themselves off of treatment, because the fight for insurance was overwhelming them at their most vulnerable time. We were at least healthy enough to fight.

Christy,

I am glad the ReddHedds had a great get-a-way. That is so important when you are caregivers.

A friend and his wife of 25+ were separated two years ago, about year after they started caregiving for a her mother and grandmother. About another 6 months after their separation, she was given the Caregiver of the Year award by the mayor of our city. My friend was so proud of his soon-to-be ex (they had decided maybe a divorce and just being friends would be best). I told him I thought the award was a dreadful shame and had honored the sad statistic that follows caregivers — a high divorce rate. I said that if they were still together, perhaps then the award would be something to be proud of from his perspective.

The next day, they were back together, caregiving together. He called me up a week later and shared that they were no longer getting a divorce and that he had moved back home. He thanked me for the kick in the rear, as did his wife. They did not want to be a sad statistic and scare people away from caregiving.

Make those respite dates a regular event for both of you. Even your FIL will be happy about it.

Thank you for yet another great post, Christy. We hope you had a great weekend.

We have had some artificial joints, conditions of concern common to aging, and other nagging worries about kids and other relatives, not to mention our dear friends – all on our minds often these days and for a long time before now. Also, I did most of the health-care paperwork for my mom in her later years.

I see a distinct series of disturbing changes occurring since I had my mom’s care and bills to contend with. You can see and hear the frustration on the faces of health care providers and their staffs also.

Our health care system in this country seems very close to being basically dysfunctional. Large segments of our population cannot find affordable health insurance even if they’re apparently perfectly healthy and young, much less if they have “pre-existing conditions” (a wicked, dehumanizing term if there ever was one!)

Every time one tries to arrange for what used to be routine care, or even emergency assistance, one must run a gauntlet of barriers and delays and miscues and outright mistakes. I’ve seen some staff of lesser skill &/or empathy simply wave patients away with dismissive gestures and harsh “get out of my face”-type rhetoric. Records at some offices are stored inaccurately if at all, patients and caregivers often must absolutely hound them to receive even a modicum of proper treatment. Even when staff are caring and attentive in attitude, you can sense the strain under which they are barely able to cope.

And then there’s the abominable, incessant parade of tv ads for prepaid funeral costs, ’so your surviving spouse or children won’t have to worry ever again. ‘ Comforting? Not really. I’d rather they provide coverage for our kids who need it, without making it a constant running battle for them.

Canada is scary? heh. NOT! We “borned” our oldest there some years ago, for $75, and he turned out o.k. C’mon USofA lawmakers and “(?)insurance companies(?)” Catch up with the times. Your citizens need you. NOW!

Sorry to hear you’re dealing with Lupus, Red. Kind of in the same boat: born with a congenital heart defect that has required major surgery twice so far, and probably will again: major pre-existing condition (”since birth” is right up there on the “pre-exisiting” list) and major risk. Which means, obviously, that I can never hope to start my own business, never go freelance, never get out from under someone else’s thumb — unless I can figure out a way to pay for the occasional $150,000 hospital vacation on my own.

Happy Birthday demi !

you may want to avoid certain liquids

Out of conscious and conviction Buddhist monks performed self- immolation to draw attention to the corruption of the Diem regime in Vietnam. I’ve wondered how long before terminal patients in the U.S. follow the same practice on the steps of the Capital to draw attention to the failed U.S. health care system.

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”

Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr

Of course, but because of my energy level it will have to be a slow one. *g* And, we should both wear those little medical masks. How’s that for an image, huh?

Oh, thanks. I’ll share that with my son.

What a sweet story! Good on you! And the couple.

Yes, I can attest. Caregiving without support from outside can create a spiraling series of stress-lines throughout a whole extended family. I will never forget the experience of having to bite my tongue, severely, to keep peace within and without, when I was once admonished by someone outside the immediate household, “Well, for heavens sake. Why don’t you just explain to her what the problem is.”

um, for the record: that does not always work when you’re a caregiver for someone who is rapidly or erratically losing their mental faculties. sigh.

I still shudder at the memory, but am glad i didn’t speak frankly to a “helpful” soul who once gave me “perfectly logical advice” on the phone from a-far, in every sense of that term. Trying to explain wouldn’t have done any good, and could easily have widened rifts in the family as a whole. Being a caregiver isn’t for sissies. It can be very hard on inter-family relations. Been there.

((((ReddHedd family)))) and all you other caregivers out there. I may not know the specific details of your particular situations, but I sympathize, and I salute you, and I urge you to take breaks whenever you can. You earn them, to be sure.

Again, thanks to all of you for the good wishes.
Since this is a virtual party, I hope it’s not too early for cake and champagne.
I’ve got fresh strawberries and angel food cake.
Pass around the party hats and noise makers.

Happy Birthday demi ;->

That smacks of socialism so it must be illegal. s/

Seriously, a very worthy attempt to encourage people to help each other……when dog-forsaken business thugs won’t. And in what forkin’ insane world wouldn’t a doctor accept payment in cash…..sounds like a doctor I would *not* want to have anything to do with.

Here’s a list of conditions that are denied coverage in
California

You can get a specific filing for a particular insurance company underwriting filings on the same site. Since I have a pre-existing condition many options for changing coverage within my provider required underwriting; so I called to check whether the list was the same for switches as new applications and mentioned that I had read the filings — they didn’t know what to do with me. After a long while I was finally told I could switch but would have to pay an increased rate.

On a humorous note, years ago before I had my pre-existing condition, I was coming off cobra and needed a plan, but I had recently fallen and fractured both my wrists. It was considered a pre-existing condition and I had to pay more for a couple of years until I was “cured”. While I said I didn’t believe klutziness was a condition, the underwriter didn’t laugh.

Hi Waccamaw!

OT: have you succeeded in finding any conservation easement/land trust information for your area?

If I knew what general area you’re in, I could ask my contacts. I’d be honored.

Exactly. People are getting rewarded handsomely by not covering policy holders — literally making a killing. Then there are the many deaths due to not having coverage at all.

Give me a break on the ‘free choice’ aspect of this, too. As I recall, policy holders don’t get to choose company health plans — HR departments do. What’s the choice? Take it or leave it? Participate in our group plan or be totally ripped off with an individual one or just opt out and cross your fingers?

As for public health concerns, just put me in the non-peeing side of the pool.

Speaking of coverage and lack there-of: I always literally got a kick out of medicare providing some miniscule level of coverage my wheel-chair-bound mom’s physical therapy, just for a short time. Their reasoning: there was no reason for therapy whatsoever unless it resulted in complete recovery. Maintenance of a stable condition meant zero, zilch! No reason for it. Nope!

Oh, and her 2ndary insurance, which was described by her insurance agent as a “cadillac” (translation: supremely generous) policy, ALSO did not cover ANY therapy. Insurance company’s hard-and-fast rule: if medicare doesn’t cover the category, neither the “cadillac” policy. Not one penny. I guess her comfort, strength, quality and length of life was worth a big fat ZERO to them.

The agent drove a nice car, though, and smiled a lot when appropriate, as it were.

You’re a dear for remembering! The desire has been a procrastination thing but given my age, it can’t be postponed indefinitely. Forgot when I asked you that easements/trusts tend to be state/regional things…..I’m in NC and do have contacts who can point me to the appropriate information. One of them being a guy who works for fish and wildlife whose property borders a narrow 40-A strip of wetland/swamp I own…….geez, can’t imagine why he might have a strong desire for me to make a commitment to get a trust set up soonest. *G*

Christy,

Here is an FAQ about COBRA under the new stimulus law.

I got laid off in October 2008. At that time I refused COBRA because it was just too expensive. Nevertheless (and it is not well understood) I am entitled to opt into the 35% COBRA under the stimulus. My employer is required to send me a notice about this second chance by mid April. For me this is a windfall, because 35% of COBRA is cheaper than what I am currently paying AND it cover prescriptions which my current plan does not. Savings all around. I hope you will take a chance at some point to remind folks of this second chance.

In my quest for coverage, I looked at a variety of options. The first was going bare — ie, no insurance. This made sense to me because (perversely) the amount I pay in insurance keeps me from going to the doctor. A friend who deals with shut ins talked me out of this option because she said hospitals will frequently turn you away in an emergency without some form of insurance. I am still not absolutely convinced that this is a bad option (since spending my insurance premiums on trips to the doctor could well prevent me from having to make a trip to the emergency room), but I will continue to pay the premiums as long as I can.

Next, I looked at discounted prescriptions. I will, though I would rather not, go to Canada (I live 150 miles from the border) if I have to. But until that becomes necessary, I have found a pretty decent discount card that saved my $130 on a three month prescription. Instead of the usual retail price — $200 — I am paying $70. This discount card is free and apparently provided through United Way. Here. It is not always such a good deal, but there are other discount options out there. Check them out.

Please indulge me as I put in my usual plug in support of Starbucks. Anyone who calls them elitist is WRONG-headed! Through our son, who works there, I know of many other professional musicians and others struggling to survive and get a toe-hold in a difficult, demanding field. Many work every extra hour they can at their jobs at Starbucks, because the founder established and maintains a firm and dependable policy of offering affordable health insurance to any employee who works at least half time, even on an extremely flexible schedule. The latter is critically important to free-lance musicians and others who need to have a flexible schedule and health insurance.
Oh, lest anyone forget, Starbucks also will do the same for the employee’s domestic partner.

Please consider supporting Starbucks. A business with a heart and fair attitude toward their employees.

McDon. & DunkinDough can razz Starbucks all they want, but I’m willing to bet their offerings for health coverage are zilch, not even in the same ballpark, not even close.

Excellent idea! I’ll ask our friend who works with OH’s Western Reserve Land Conservancy about NC also.

I love it when nature lovers network, heh.

FWIW, more on health care up top…

Hey. I just googled “North Carolina land trust” and stirred up a bunch.

Also “North Carolina conservancy” produced another bundle.

The former list is probably going to be more useful for you, but your friend would know.

The humungous, world-wide, “The Nature Conservancy” is less likely to want the land unless it’s extensive. However, when you mention bordering marshes, etc. you never know.

I think the whole land trust idea is growing more popular, and also becoming much more user-friendly than it was when we got our easement in 1998. That kind of easement leaves complete ownership in your hands, and people with farms often, at the time of setting up the easement, set aside part(s) of the land that they are free to split off for sale separately from the rest, so-as to preserve some source of income for the future. The land trust organizations seem very understanding of such needs, and should work with you.

Here’s a website that should prove helpful:

http://www.landtrustalliance.org/

Good luck, and keep us posted.

And THANK YOU! “Our” warblers and thrushes probably depend on you as they head north to us and beyond. Cool!

apologies for all the OT stuff, Ms. Christy and pups.

thanks so much, Christy, for your wonderful post. Some years ago I wrote in my neuropathy newsletter that there were many long term care policy insurers denying coverage to folks because of diabetes (because of the potential for neuropathy) and neuropathy from a multitude of causes (there are some 200, including commonly prescribed medications for cancer, HIV, etc.). I assume that the practice has expanded and deepened by now. I’m hoping that the VA does not follow suit for all those returning disabled vets with enormous nerve damage for whom neuropathy will be a major part of their future lives. I’m sickened by the possibility that the health reform debate will result in only tweaks on the fringes of the status quo rather than real change. Thanks for all you do.
Blessings,

Nature red in tooth and claw?

Don’t blame Charles Darwin for what sycophants made of his discovery. Social Darwinism is Calvinism in secular clothing — I’m well off because I deserve to be. I deserve to be well-off because I have the right genes. You’re not well off because you don’t have the right genes (and hence, don’t deserve to be.) The Calvinist doctrine said the well-off were God’s elect, and so deserved His bountiful blessings.

Feh, on both. If the Theory of Evolution teaches us anything, it teaches us that Nature is capricious. Einstein was wrong, the universe is run with dice. If you’re well-off it’s much more likely that you’re so because you got lucky. You were born into the right family (Rockefellers, Mellons, etc.) and so inherited great wealth, as opposed to being the founder of that line. Or you were lucky in finding a winning formula and exploiting it competently (J.K. Rowling, I’m looking at you.)

Oh my god. You hear stories like this but I haven’t met anyone who had to do it, short of old widowed folks who don’t marry their would-be-second-spouses for similar reasons.

I am so sorry to hear that.
Wonder if the insurance/medi-Cal folks will take a page in reverse from INS (oops, sorry, ICE) and make you prove you’re not still living together.

This is so sad and infuriating. Does anyone think Canadians and Brits and French ever have to get divorced to be able to pay for health care? The “horrors” indeed.

Out-of-Network Health Insurance scam to be scrutinized by Jello Jay:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..00082.html

- Tom

I’m just getting back to this issue after an afternoon of virtual pavement-pounding.

This practice of data-mining for prescription and medical condition info, which is then sold to the insurance companies is really, really bothering me. What is the point of HIPAA if it doesn’t prevent this sort of sleaziness?

I read the article, and see that the 3 data-mining companies claim they comply with all privacy laws, and ”Ingenix requires each Medpoint client to obtain the authorization of the individual applicant or insured person,” said Ingenix spokeswoman Karin Olson.

A moment’s contemplation brings me to this conclusion – this is covered by those blanket “authorization to release all relevant information” to insurers, etc., that you sign at your doctor’s office, before surgery, etc. But I don’t recall signing any such doc when signing up for my employer-provided health insurance. In fact, it was all on-line, no signatures needed.

Does this mean it (the data-mining) only happens when you buy an individual or small-group policy?

Hmmm. I may have to look up the text of HIPAA just to see where the weasel words are. The more I think about it, the more burned up I am feeeling.
Anybody else?

I think it actually may be covered more by the blanket authorization you sign when you are trying to obtain insurance coverage from the insurer, if I had to guess. Not from the doctor’s authorization. The ones from the doctor are routinely act specific, as I recall — it’s been a while since I’ve had a surgical procedure, so I’m reaching back to my lump removal when The Peanut was 3-months-old to recall the text. But I’m fairly certain it pertained to the particulars of my surgery and not all records at all times for any purpose.

But when you sign up for insurance, be it health insurance, life or term — there is a blanket authorization that is fairly standard in all of those which you have to sign in order to be considered for insurance coverage. And that blanket authorization opens that door, I’m fairly certain — at least, that would certainly be their argument.

You don’t have to have health insurance, you are contracting for it — and they don’t have to give it to you unless you give them all the information up front to reject you out of hand. See how tidy that is?

Pardon me while I get more coffee…

See how tidy that is?

Shaking head sadly. And I’m sure you’re right about the authorization.