Not enough, AMA
A health care proposal by the AMA to insure everyone includes taking away the tax break that people who pay for health insurance through their employers, effectively raising taxes on working people and making it more expensive for them to buy insurance.
The proposal calls for making health insurance affordable for everyone to purchase. Does that include people who make minimum wage and can’t even afford decent housing? Such people don’t qualify for Medicaid for the most part. Mike was turned down in Georgia because he had a beat up old car worth $500, so he had too many assets.
Mike had to separate from Janet and move in with me, sign a paper saying he didn’t intend to try to fix his marriage and prove he had no income. I had to show proof that I was paying bills for him.
We humiliate and demean people before we help them and I don’t think the AMA plan as it is would change that a whole lot.
My friend, Scott Rogers, runs a ministry that includes a clinic, and the people he sees can’t afford $30, let alone $300.
The proposal talks about government regulation, but then talks about how much insurance companies hate government regulation.
It has some good points, such as helping low-income people get health insurance, making insurance companies cover everyone, even those who are sick.
But a private industry that has as much power over people’s lives as insurance companies do needs to be regulated closely to make it do the right thing. Greed is a very powerful motivator and somebody needs to make industry do the right thing.
The AMA proposal is a start, but it doesn’t do enough. So, let’s talk. Let’s take the things that will work and toss the things that won’t.
Check out the proposal at /www.voicefortheuninsured.org/
Tags: Patient Pals & Family Friends
Life o' Mike has a new peer support program for people newly diagnosed with chronic or serious illness or with a new disability and their caregivers.
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