It shouldn’t be a matter of charity

The fatal stabbings on the Max were terrible.  Girls harassed for their appearance, good people dead, a person who was quite possibly mentally incompetent taken into custody. And don’t forget the guy who robbed the dead guy of his wallet, backpack and wedding ring.

Here’s a follow-up story that is ostensibly good news.  The person who stepped in, got stabbed and survived will not have to pay out of pocket injuries incurred while doing the right thing.  But this article mostly makes me mad.

“Fletcher briefly choked up as he told [Legacy CEO Dr. George] Brown how much the waiver meant to him and his family.” I’ll bet it did.

As someone (with insurance that my company pays $485/month) who just paid $2,700 for a diagnostic mammogram, I can imagine just how much the medical care Fletcher received cost.

When I read a report of cost of care being waived, I’m happy for the person who receives this charity.  But the US needs to move to a system where everyone is covered for everything and no one has to worry about if they can afford what they need to live.

Articles like this remind me of the DJ, visiting Portland from elsewhere, who went to sleep at the Jupiter Hotel, and woke up to a cab driving through the wall of his motel, causing horrific injuries.  The cab was driven by a guy who went into a diabetic coma (something that probably would have a good chance of not happening with a functioning healthcare system) and that diabetic coma put a working member of society into our medical system through no fault of his own.  His life was changed forever.  I’m sure the bills on top of that were crushing.

We need to find a way to cover all people.  People who step up in tense situations, people who find automobiles on top of them in their hotel rooms, people who make bad choices and end up with preventable diseases, and people who are just stuck with what they are stuck with due to genetics, chemicals in the environment, what have you. We’re all Americans, and we all deserve care.

2 thoughts on “It shouldn’t be a matter of charity”

  1. I agree, the state of health care in the U.S. is abysmal. I feel like the fact that medical bills can be forgiven at all (my mother’s were also completely forgiven by the hospital, where she worked) is proof that there’s wiggle room in the system. I don’t know what the answer is (single payer?) but it’s clear that something needs to change.

    1. I’m so glad to hear that your mother’s medical bills were forgiven.

      I really hate waste, and I feel like I and my employer are paying into a system where there is a ton of waste/graft. Surely there’s a way to get all Americans good, economical coverage?

      At work we’ve been doing some work around healthcare stuff and it feels like people have such diminished expectations. People would describe ridiculous conditions (only insuring their child, because they couldn’t afford to insure themselves) and then rate their healthcare as “pretty good.” That is a Very Bad situation. I don’t know what they were thinking. And it wasn’t just one person.

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