Dealing With Headaches

Gee — guess what you think I’m going to say. Universal health insurance coverage is a big issue in America (where it doesn’t exist) and England (where it’s dying fast). Americans, especailly older generation Baby Boomers, have been conditioned to pay through the nose for health care. They have had it drilled into their heads that you only get what you pay for — so if it’s free, avoid it like the plague (sorry about the cliche and the pun).

And this attitude is killing them fast, as well as their children. There are more than 47 million uninsured Americans and who knows how many underinsured Americans. Underinsaured is actually about as worthless as not having insurance at all. Underinssured could mean that you have to pay a few hundred dollars of your own medical bills before the insurance will begin to cover it. Some means that they will cover emergency trips to the hopsital — but not prescription drugs or routinge office visits. The list of exclusions goes on.

What About Comunism?

I had this argument about universal health care coverage with my Dad (who is of the afore-mentioned generation) and he argued that socialized medicine could lead to Communism. He said that paying doctors more than in other countries encourages America to get the best doctors. They studied hard — they had the right to get paid more than other doctors.

This was before his wife (my stepmother) was dropped from her health insurance company. Now, he sings a slightly different tune.

But, you can see what proponents of universial health care coverage are up against.

What About Long Waiting Lists?

One of the biggest arguments against universal health care coverage is that the countries that have remnants of it (Canada, England) have long waiting lists for operations or to see specialists. This wouldn’t be the case if there were more doctors and dentists in the program. When given the choice of going into lucrative privitization practices or sticking with the NHS, are you really surprised that most English doctors and dentists remove themselves from the NHS progam?

Doctors, hospitals, Big Pharma and medical insurance companies have turned something that can save lives into big business. And, as we know, Big Business is sacred and not to be touched.

We deserve better than this. It’s our lives that are at stake. We don;t pay the police very well and we don’t pay firefighters anything (or next to nothing), and they save lives. Why should the health care business bleed us to death? If you insist on paying them fabulous sums of money, then we need at least a 40% rise in wages, free marijuana or free something to counterbalance these outrageous health care costs.

Perhaps if enough people die (or enough celelbrities, or politicians, which apparently count as more than one person), then maybe something will happen. Until then, we all suffer.