health _____________________________________________________
Date Line April 11, 2008
Date Line April 11, 2008
New York Times: “In fact, Mrs. Clinton was accurately repeating the story as it was told to her — and it turns out that while some of the details were slightly off, the essentials of her story were correct. After all the fuss, The Washington Post eventually conceded that “Bachtel’s medical tragedy began with circumstances very close to the essence” of Mrs. Clinton’s account.”
The story was, of course, the one which Hillary Clinton was lambasted for repeating – that of a pregnant woman named Trina Bachtel who was told she needed to begin making payments on her past hospital bill prior to receiving a new course of treatment related to her pregnancy.
Idiots – mostly mainstream media big mouths (Rush Limbaugh types) who make more noise than sense – attacked Hillary when they should have checked the story. Basically, the hospital administrators lied, when asked if they denied care until an outstanding bill was paid.
Well DUH! You would be hard pressed to find a hospital which can afford to run an open tab on a patient who refuses to pay.
Now! Yep! You will find other idiots who will talk about medicaid and coverage for the poor. Get real! There is none – except for those who have nothing.
If you own any assets – you need to sell them before the Government will step in. If you try to sell and nobody buys, in theory you get coverage. But that is just theory. Reality is you will be denied coverage – and in one case I know well, you will be denied coverage because someone else owns the property and, based upon court order, because they have not appeared, you are its administrator.
Remember, this is the same governmental structure which says the family of soldier who dies from wounds sustained in Iraq must PROVE the cause of death was service related. If you are disabled in Iraq, or Afghanistan, you must also PROVE service related cause. That is, being shot, or blown up while serving your nation is not sufficient proof that your injuries are service relate.
A pregnant women getting medical care? Gee, when she is at death’s door – and can prove it with the medical records she has yet to obtain because she has been denied treatment – she can get emergency room treatment.
As Bush has stated, and McCain apparently supports, “After all, you just go to an emergency room.” If you have the sniffles, you can go to the emergency room; if a cough, the emergency room; if a splinter, the emergency room. You can go there – they might treat you at a cost which those who cannot afford a doctor most certainly cannot afford.
Emergency room costs are the highest in the hospital. They must be. Only the emergency room must keep staff on duty when there are no patients. Emergency room staffing must be at a level which would allow them to deal with a true emergency – like that ten car pile-up, or the terrorist attack, airline crash, or ... pick the catastrophic event.
America has, without doubt, the world’s best catastrophic health care treatment facilities. We have them because we need them. We will not treat the splinter until it becomes infected; and then probably not until gangrene has set in.
We have children dying – like Trina Bachtel’s – because we deny their mother’s basic care. Pay $500 a month for medical insurance – $6,000 a year after taxes on a salary of $40,000 ... that’s 15% of earnings. Pay, and pay and pay – only to learn, when you need the insurance, that you have a co-pay that will place you in bankruptcy. WHY? Because the insurance does not require, nor would it pay for, basic preventative medical care.
OH RIGHT – according to Bush and McCain, preventative medical care is what you get at the Emergency Room.
America is the only industrialize nation with out universal health care – because of that we pay twice as much as every other industrialized nation for health care which is only marginally better than a third world nation. In the case of Trina Bachtel, she would have better off in Cuba (where people only make $17 a day). Babies in Cuba have a higher probability of surviving the birth process than those in America.
Come to think of it, for all their suffering, Cubans live longer than Americans and in better health. Of course, those who live better than anyone on the planet – and who have the lowest carbon footprint – are Scandinavians. They have a cradle to grave “Nanny State” and the highest standard of living in the world; and they manage it without any of America’s natural resources.
The story was, of course, the one which Hillary Clinton was lambasted for repeating – that of a pregnant woman named Trina Bachtel who was told she needed to begin making payments on her past hospital bill prior to receiving a new course of treatment related to her pregnancy.
Idiots – mostly mainstream media big mouths (Rush Limbaugh types) who make more noise than sense – attacked Hillary when they should have checked the story. Basically, the hospital administrators lied, when asked if they denied care until an outstanding bill was paid.
Well DUH! You would be hard pressed to find a hospital which can afford to run an open tab on a patient who refuses to pay.
Now! Yep! You will find other idiots who will talk about medicaid and coverage for the poor. Get real! There is none – except for those who have nothing.
If you own any assets – you need to sell them before the Government will step in. If you try to sell and nobody buys, in theory you get coverage. But that is just theory. Reality is you will be denied coverage – and in one case I know well, you will be denied coverage because someone else owns the property and, based upon court order, because they have not appeared, you are its administrator.
Remember, this is the same governmental structure which says the family of soldier who dies from wounds sustained in Iraq must PROVE the cause of death was service related. If you are disabled in Iraq, or Afghanistan, you must also PROVE service related cause. That is, being shot, or blown up while serving your nation is not sufficient proof that your injuries are service relate.
A pregnant women getting medical care? Gee, when she is at death’s door – and can prove it with the medical records she has yet to obtain because she has been denied treatment – she can get emergency room treatment.
As Bush has stated, and McCain apparently supports, “After all, you just go to an emergency room.” If you have the sniffles, you can go to the emergency room; if a cough, the emergency room; if a splinter, the emergency room. You can go there – they might treat you at a cost which those who cannot afford a doctor most certainly cannot afford.
Emergency room costs are the highest in the hospital. They must be. Only the emergency room must keep staff on duty when there are no patients. Emergency room staffing must be at a level which would allow them to deal with a true emergency – like that ten car pile-up, or the terrorist attack, airline crash, or ... pick the catastrophic event.
America has, without doubt, the world’s best catastrophic health care treatment facilities. We have them because we need them. We will not treat the splinter until it becomes infected; and then probably not until gangrene has set in.
We have children dying – like Trina Bachtel’s – because we deny their mother’s basic care. Pay $500 a month for medical insurance – $6,000 a year after taxes on a salary of $40,000 ... that’s 15% of earnings. Pay, and pay and pay – only to learn, when you need the insurance, that you have a co-pay that will place you in bankruptcy. WHY? Because the insurance does not require, nor would it pay for, basic preventative medical care.
OH RIGHT – according to Bush and McCain, preventative medical care is what you get at the Emergency Room.
America is the only industrialize nation with out universal health care – because of that we pay twice as much as every other industrialized nation for health care which is only marginally better than a third world nation. In the case of Trina Bachtel, she would have better off in Cuba (where people only make $17 a day). Babies in Cuba have a higher probability of surviving the birth process than those in America.
Come to think of it, for all their suffering, Cubans live longer than Americans and in better health. Of course, those who live better than anyone on the planet – and who have the lowest carbon footprint – are Scandinavians. They have a cradle to grave “Nanny State” and the highest standard of living in the world; and they manage it without any of America’s natural resources.
American’s (at least the right wing, McCain, Bush, Limbaugh types) deserve to be where they are headed. Too bad the right wing, McCain, Bush, Limbaugh types are so devoted to taking the rest of us down to hell with them.
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