Excerpt: "What Mr. Romney fails to understand is that there is a difference between acute health problems that require an emergency department and, well, the other 99% of medical care."
Romney says that Americans without health insurance can just go to ER. (photo: Laniado Hospital)
Mitt Romney Channels Ebenezer Scrooge on 60 Minutes
25 September 12
ast night on 60 minutes Mitt Romney was questioned about health care. When asked if the government had a responsibility to care for the fifty million Americans who don't have health insurance he replied,
"Well, we do provide care for people who don't have insurance, people - we - if someone has a heart attack, they don't sit in their apartment and - and die. We - pick them up in an ambulance, and take them to the hospital, and give them care."
What Mr. Romney fails to understand is that there is a difference between acute health problems that require an emergency department and, well, the other 99% of medical care. It is true, due to EMTALA if you are uninsured and have a medical condition requiring emergency care that you will not be booted out of the emergency department. Medical professionals don't look at your insurance card before pulling out the crash cart, so you are likely to get excellent emergency care regardless of your ability to pay.
However, the 70-year-old stroke victim who needs physical therapy can't get that in the ER.
Neither can the two-year-old who needs feeding therapy.
Or the 42-year-old woman who needs chemo for her breast cancer.
Or the 47-year-old man who needs insulin for his diabetes.
Or the 22-year-old who needs a Pap smear.
Or the 6-year-old who needs an influenza vaccine.
What happens when people rely on the ER for their safety net is that they go without care or get a bill that they can't ever hope to pay (and still likely didn't get the care they really needed because an ER can only do so much). Hospitals then have no choice but to either charge health insurances more to recoup their losses or to close their emergency departments.
That is why, Mr. Romney, I have seen and wept over women with breast cancers eroding through their skin. Something that could have been prevented by a mammogram and lumpectomy four years earlier. And I have wept over women with cervical cancers who bled to death for want of a Pap smear and a simple office procedure 5 years earlier.
Mr. Romney, what would you say right now to someone suffering from an illness that is inadequately treated (or perhaps not even treated at all) because the have no health insurance or enough money to pay for care. "Are there no emergency rooms?"
What's next, "Are there no work houses?"
Beware ignorance, Mr. Romney.
Dr. Jennifer Gunter is a nationally and internationally renowned obstetrician/gynecologist. She is the recipient of numerous research awards and has published extensively in medical journals and authored many book chapters. "The Preemie Primer" is her first book. Her writing has also appeared in USA Today, the A Cup of Comfort series, KevinMD.com, EmpowHer.com, Exceptional Parent, Parents Press, Sacramento Parent, and the Marin Independent Journal. Dr. Gunter also writes a sexual health column for examiner.com. She has been interviewed by numerous national media outlets and magazines, including CNN.com, More, US News and World Report, Runner's World, Glamour, Redbook, Woman's World, and Shape.
Dr. Gunter was born and raised in Winnipeg, Canada, and graduated from The University of Manitoba School of Medicine in 1990 at the age of 23. In 1995 she completed her OB/GYN training at the University of Western Ontario and moved to the United States to complete a fellowship in infectious diseases at the University of Kansas. After completing her fellowship she continued her studies in pain medicine and currently is the only OB/GYN in the United States who is board certified in both OB/GYN and pain medicine. Dr. Gunter is one of the select few physicians in the United States who holds four board certifications.
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OBAMA - BIDEN 2012!!!!! GET OUT TO VOTE AND GET OUT THE VOTE!!! NEVER VOTE TEATHUG, REPUG, BLUE DOG, OR RED ELEPHANT!!!!!
I myself went from a good six-figure self employed income WITH decent insurance to being bankrupted and becoming one of the "New Poor" as a direct cause of getting seriously sick once and being taken to the ER, to intensive care, not being able to work for several months, and have never really recovered financially.
This is why I have never become a US citizen and plan to leave when I have accomplished a couple of things where I live. I've twice, in non-emergency situations flown to the UK, been well cared for (I paid into that system during my working life there), had convalescent time and flown back for less than half the price even insured care here would have covered, including the airfares.
Every time I see or hear an ambulance now, I automatically think -"There goes a hefty bill for some poor sod!".
Seems elementary, dunnit.
I just got back into the US and am one year away from Medicare, trying to get health insurance, and being denied coverage for things that have been resolved, and I've not needed nor had treatment for for 3 years! I'm stunned and want to pack my bags and go back to a FAR more civilized Europe.
I see nothing but hardship ahead for so many solid, hardworking people, it saddens me beyond belief. And it scares me like the dickens (pun intended).
N.
We can get a basic economic justice system through, we just have to have the guts to demand it ... and there will be violence against the leaders and followers - i think that is what people are afraid of in the backs of their minds.
This is already ugly, and the histrionics of the Republicans in the media are merely veiled threats of violence and murder.
What I wonder is why if America is so brilliant and the market conquers all that we cannot figure out how to do both of these things? I think it is in asking that question that we see the dishonesty in the military congressional industrial complex, that is, it has been taken over by people who have an endless supply of cash and who have an attitude of fascist contempt for the country as defined by the people in it as opposed to the elite halls of power.
The elite seems to think everyone exists to be used and exploited like farm animals or natural resources ... they talk about the Constitution but ignore the "pursuit of happiness" phase.
We have a real problem.
This is basically a virtual concentration labor camp. You can get a job at sub-survival wages and keep living, but you cannot prosper without health care, education, transportation, decent food - and most Americans are addicted to a fast food junk diet that makes them sick - faster and faster. They get sick and they die or need medical care.
The problem has always been that business escapes the cost of the damage they do. To justify that they call it burdensome regulation.
Really fine observation and a lesson for the rest of us to pay attention to Romney's words.
That's just what I wrote -except that I was at the upper end of the "middle class" income bracket and HAD insurance- and it still ruined me and put three people out of work in the process. It's (I think) the biggest cause of bankruptcy in the US AND a real small-business killer if one wants to provide owner and employee with some measure of coverage.
I've come to the conclusion that we may as well do without the monthly expense until we move back to Europe, as they'll never get it outa me anyway if I get sick again (Gawd forbid!).
It always amazes me when Americans get all dewy-eyed every Yuletide when "A Christmas Carol" is broadcast on the owner-media but can't see the latter and present-day connection to their own lives and that of others around them
Humbug on vouchers; are there no sweatshops, no Walmarts?
If you think you are having heart problems and do what the doctors tell you to do, even if it turns out to be indigestion - you will owe about $10,000 for one ER visit. If it is a false alarm, or even if it isn't, you are stuck with a bill they will follow you for the rest of your life.
This is just slavery because our lifestyles make us sick, all the ads and traditions of American and the media points us to fast food and junk food, and toxic chemicals and pesticides - you can bet Mitt Romney never has to eat that crap, then when people get sick everything they own including their futures are sucked up into a big debt machine until there is nothing left.
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