Flat Earth, healthy tobacco, status quo health care — all wrong
I wrote a story last week about how COBRA, the 1986 law that allows people who lose their jobs to keep their insurance, is inadequate. (http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009901100308).
Well, the Heritage Foundation noticed and sent me an e-mail this morning offering me a source on the other side. This is their source and her quote in the Washington Post:
But Nina Owcharenko, a health policy analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said it would be wiser to offer unemployed Americans a broad range of health insurance options, including high-deductible private policies or new state-based programs.
Given how expensive COBRA is, she said, alternatives would “save the individual money and save taxpayer money.”
I won’t be calling Nina.
As a reporter, I have to be fair. But sometimes, there’s right and there’s wrong, and I don’t feel obligated to give voice to what’s wrong. We no longer quote people who say tobacco is good for you, that psychiatric illness is actually caused by demons or that the Earth is flat.
To say that the private sector can solve the health care crisis without help from the federal government is wrong. A high-deductible insurance policy wouldn’t have saved Mike’s life — in fact, because of his high risk of cancer, he couldn’t get private health insurance.
The state? Medicaid made him separate from his wife to get care and that was only after he was diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer and it had recurred.
My benchmark is this: Would it have saved Mike’s life?
Nothing done yet would have. He needed a $3,000 colonoscopy and was denied it repeatedly. He was between 18 and 64, so there was nothing for him.
So, give me this: Allow everyone access to lifesaving diagnostic tests and basic health care.
But tell me that the private sector can take care of it with no help — or regulation — from government and I’ll tell you to go jump off the edge of the Earth. And take your tobacco with you.
Have a beer in May
Stop into Altamont Brewing, 1042 Haywood Road, West Asheville, any time in May and ask for their "charity" beer of the day. Buy one and Life o' Mike gets $1. In fact, we get a buck for each one sold. So go in every day and have one to support Life o' Mike.
Thanks, Altamont!
Patient Pals & Family Friends
Life o' Mike has a peer support program for people with one or more serious or chronic medical issues or disabilities.
We aim to reduce isolation and fear among people who have conditions, including psychiatric illness, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, mild dementia or other cognitive disorder or disability, thereby reducing depression and complications as people learn to improve self-management of their medical conditions.
Patient Pals help alleviate feelings of isolation and frustration. They can help people develop a list of questions to ask the doctor and then accompany the person to the doctor to make sure all the questions are answered, taking notes to be sure the person understands the doctor’s answers.
Our trained volunteers also accompany their “Pals” to art exhibits, movies and walks outdoors, meet for coffee, call to check in and more.
Our Pals have experienced weight loss, improvement in diabetes, HIV, psoriasis, depression and more, just because they have someone who cares about them. Some relationships develop into longer-term friendships; other Pals move on to more independent lives.
Family Friends are there to help caregivers and other family members grow into their new role.
We need volunteers, who are asked to donate a minimum of one hour a week. Training is free and includes information on active listening, ways to help and when to know more help is needed.
And of course, we need funding.
To learn more, call Leslie Boyd at 828-243-6712 or e-mail lifeomike@gmail.com.
Start From Seed
Life o' Mike has a new program- Start from Seed (SFS).
SFS is a volunteer doula program aimed at providing non-medical, comprehensive support to low income, high-risk women and families of Buncombe County focusing on three areas:
1. We help new doulas with certification and training in return for their participation as a volunteer doula for SFS
2. We mentor volunteer doulas with their first few clients
3. Our volunteer doulas provide birth and postpartum doula services to low income, high risk moms, providing support and tools to empower them as a new parent.
A birth doula is a trained and experienced professional who provides continuous physical, emotional and informational support to the mother before, during and just after birth; a postpartum doula provides emotional and practical support during the postpartum period.
Start from Seed clients are referred to us from the Buncombe County Department of Health’s Nurse-Family Partnership Program, Western North Carolina Community Health Services, and Mission Hospital. The Program is intended and designed for growing clients’ inner strength and helping them gain empowerment to help them cope with the emotional, physical and mental challenges of childbirth, labor, and motherhood.
Our new moms and their infants have many needs. If you would like to help them get off to a good start, please visit our Start from Seed web site: Start from Seed, or call Program Director Chelsea Kouns at 804-814-9946.
When I turned 23, my healthcare coverage was discontinued since I was no longer a student. I am not insurable because I am bipolar and require medications each month that will prevent me from doing harm to myself and others. So we had to sign me up for COBRA, at $357 a month. My new medication is $300 without insurance, and that\’s monthly. My once monthly visits to the psychiatrist would probably be $200 a visit, and $125 with sessions with my therapist. Apparently because I have a disease in which I have no control over that I was genetically pre-dispositioned I am no longer human and deserving of a stable livelihood.