Yuku free message boards

If I happen to get hit by a bus and am unconscious and unable to get my application in, and my medical care during my coma runs up to $100,000, I just declare bankruptcy after I'm discharged.

This is not an option that was granted by the ACA. This option of running up big bills and then declaring bankruptcy has been a "right" we've all had all along. The bills can be of most any kind, medical, credit card or other debt. I know people who've had to go through bankruptcy and it wasn't nearly as much fun as you make it sound. The bankruptcy laws have been considerably tightened. Having a terrible credit rating is expensive for a long long time.

The much more usual scenario is the one we have now with the free-riders. The Center for Disease Control says that between 10% and 50% of all visits to emergency rooms are for nonemergency matters that could be treated more effectively and more economically in an urgent care setting or clinic. But people have to pay real money or have insurance to go to a clinic. Only the hospitals are forbidden from tossing out nonpaying customers. So the hospitals are expending huge sums of money treating people who can't pay, and they pass all those costs on to the people who can pay. That' s why hospital bills are so ridiculous, charging $400 for an aspirin, etc. It's "socialized medicine" of the worst, most inefficient, most bureaucratic sort. We are paying the highest prices for the worst system of medical care.

Sometimes I fantasize that it might even be a good idea to let the hospitals turn away the free-riders for a period of time, at least the ones who could have afforded to buy themselves some health insurance. If you have the money to pay for health insurance and you decide to buy a new car instead, why are we supposed to bail you out when you get hit by a truck? If a few of these people got tossed out into the street it might motivate the rest of them. Of course it isn't going to happen, nor should it. None of us want to see people dying in the street. But the parasites on the system do make the rest of us mad.

With all the medical problems you've had I'm amazed that you're so cavalier about the prospect of going without coverage. You even answered llilly's question of what you would have done without insurance by claiming that you might have been better off since some of your treatments were harmful. What a facetious response. Are you seriously claiming that people who go without health insurance have better health outcomes than people who are insured? There is a TON of data saying that is not true and surely you know it.

I saw a program the other night about the response of citizens of Massachusetts to Romneycare. Most of the pople interviewed were satisfied with it, but a few were not. Some were a libertarian couple who believed the state has no business supporting any medical care. I remember the young woman sneering that she goes to the doctor sometimes and she always pays her own way. "It's $50", she said. "So I pay the $50 myself, what's the big deal?"

In the background you could see her two small children playing. If anything should happen to one of those kids, cancer, accident, autoimmune disease, meningitis, MRSA, anything, she would rapidly learn what a "big deal" really is. She would learn that $50 would be a drop in the ocean of bills that come pouring out of a pediatric intensive care unit. These are the type of ignorant irresponsible free-riders that make me see red. These are also the same type of people who refuse to get their kids vaccinated, not only placing them at risk but everyone else as well. One would think that natural selection would have taken care of lineages like that long ago.

Real life:
"Now here's crazy for you......when I was laid off from my job I was able to
keep my insurance that had a 5,000. deductible and 1,800 out of pocket.
In a matter of 6 months I was already about 10,000 in debt. My premiums
were 492.00 a month. I eventually had to go on Medicaid and with it I
have an 800.00 per month spend down they call it. During a call to the
Medicaid office I became a bit upset with the woman I was talking to trying
to explain to her that there was no way I could pay 800.00 a month, I was now
on disability. Here's what she said to me. "Ma'am you should be grateful that you
are getting Medicaid at all.......Medicaid is for the indigent and since you are on
disability you are not considered indigent."
I was sooo ++%@#+ ! All I could say was, "Excuse me, but I have worked since I was
16 years old, and I'm only "getting" what I've earned all these years, and I DID NOT
ask for cancer." Then I started sobbing. All that hate I have for this disease I
suddenly could not control......its very humiliating to have worked as long and as
hard as I have worked to suddenly find yourself on Medicaid........and Disability.
I live a very simple life now."

Back by popular demand, stories from the front lines:

"My family is a perfect example of how Cancer can take it all...... My daughter was diagnosed with Leukemia at age six in the beginning of 2008. Since this year was a big hit with the recession and my daughter's first eight months of treatment were in and out of the hospital my husband and I ended up loosing our family business of 13 years, then came our cars being repoed and then our home... We have another daughter two years older than our cancer kid and it has been the toughest three years of our lives. My father in law who lives near us and was involved in our business just left us and said we will loose everything (he had recently remaried to a horrible woman who wasn't supportive and I guess he chose her). The kicker was that his wife (my sweet mother in law died years earlier of cancer)....

Anyway, we are now in a cramped two bedroom duplex, my husband only works here and there so he could take over getting our daughter to treatment. I got a job as an Administrative Assistant (since I had experience) and still have it but things are so tight. My husband has a 1994 vehicle and I had to finance an old used car and pay a "million" percentage rate since we had to file bankruptcy. We were getting sued in between hospital visits for credit cards and our business so we had to file. Even so, we are struggling and in financial ruin even though my daughter's treatment is over. We never lived over the top but we had our own business, new cars, a nice home etc... Now it is all gone due to CANCER. With this tough economy and our ruined credit is is almost impossible to start over to climb back up. Let's not mention the medical bills for copays and deductibles. JUST NOT FAIR !"