Healthcare thread.

When I was 24, I found a lump in my breast. I went for consultation at the Breast Clinic at a famous hospital. The biopsy revealed a malignant tumor that had to be removed immediately.

This was the second lump I’d found, the first when I was 20 and still

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under my parents’ healthcare which I had removed at a Florida hospital. I didn't give insurance or paying a medical bill a second thought.

But this time I was on my own. This second lump was different and had me scared.

This time, the doctor gave me the results of the tests

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and told me “unfortunately, this hospital will not admit you. They will refuse to do the surgery here because you are uninsured (I not only lived paycheck to paycheck, but wasn’t given nor could I afford healthcare insurance).” He then gave me the address of a small private

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clinic where I could have the tumor removed as an outpatient for $500 cash.

Needless to say I was stunned, by the fact I was carrying a malignant tumor in my breast but also that I was refused care by a hospital. I left his office, went to the elevators to leave and found

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a woman standing there…sobbing. A tall, slender, African American woman about 20 or so years older than I was standing there crying. She grabbed my hand and started telling me what happened to her - I just knew she needed to unload the fear and pain to someone, anyone.

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I listened.

She had had the same diagnosis as I but she had neither health insurance nor the $500 for a private clinic, and no one to turn to for help.

I wasn’t rich by any means of the word: I earned $1000/month in New York City, my rent was $500 which left me $500 for

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subway, utility bills, food, expenses for the month. Not a lot for New York but I knew I could scrape together the money - with my brother’s help if I needed it - for the operation while still covering my living expenses. This woman could not. She knew that she had just been

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given a death sentence. In a hospital by a doctor.

And she sobbed & talked and I listened & hugged her. I had left my own consultation feeling like one of the disadvantaged, one of the many Americans unable to afford the luxury of insurance, unable to enjoy the privilege

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of not struggling in the face of a medical emergency. I now felt like one of the privileged because I was able to do what this woman could not: scrape together just enough money for outpatient surgery.

A month or so later I had the operation. I still think about that woman

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at the elevators to this day.

This incident happened a year or so after I graduated college - where I saw to my dismay the cost of tuition for that private school jump from $8K/year to $12K/year the semester I left while Reagan’s GOP was slashing Pell Grants & student

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assistance, both of which made it possible for me to attend that school. (the cost of a year’s tuition today is $51K). The widening disparity between rich, middle class, poor was more and more evident every day.

The following year my father got sick and began his rapid

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decline into what was eventually diagnosed as Alzheimer’s for lack of doctors being able to diagnosis his extremely inexplicable symptoms - but what we would 20+ years later realize was the same rare strain of ALS that my brother had. He rapidly developed dementia, stopped

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talking, was no longer able to feed, clothe, shower, walk, or take care of himself. Mom was still working and was finding it impossible to take care of him on her own.

After a year of consulting doctors, we decided to apply to his Veterans’ Benefits to cover hospice care

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for dad.

It was denied.

My sister (a doctor who took charge of all this) said “we were informed that Reagan changed the rules for these benefits and we now have to prove a direct link between his service and his illness.” Direct link? His service was during WWII 40+

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years earlier & his illness was undiagnosed. Our only option, they had explained, was mom quitting her job, giving away her savings, home, belongings, legally declaring herself destitute & throwing herself on the mercy of the state. Then dad’s hospice would be covered.

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Dad was not only a WWII veteran but had spent his entire adult life as a federal employee - working for the US government. He served his country, devoted his adult life to his government, and when he needed them they refused to help him in return.

My mom and dad, me and

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that poor woman at the elevators, and millions like us…we were disposable. As far as our country was concerned, or so I felt at that time, we were all just plain dispensable. Our lives did not matter.

These are some but not all of the stories that left me devastated and

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disillusioned with my country & its politics, that drove me out to look for a place with a system that respected all of its citizens, helped those in need, saw a link between lifting up its citizens for the overall good of the community, society, and country.

The end. Sort of.

Actually no it isn't. My brother worked for a huge law firm and had what my sister called "the Rolls Royce of private health insurance". He got sick. His company let him go. He lost his insurance and social security refused to help (I can't remember the details). Our requests

for coverage of home care - non-medical - was refused. Our request for coverage of an experimental treatment his doctor wanted to try was refused. Everything was refused. God damn them all to hell. Just like for dad, he ended up spending his last year at mom's and we all took

turns helping take care of him.