March 03, 2008

National shame

If you watched "60 Minutes" last night you probably saw a segment about Remote Area Medical, a charity which was founded to provide health care to people who can't get regular access to it by virtue of where they live. It was pretty startling. They set up shop in Knoxville, TN on the weekend of January 5-6 of this year, served several thousand people, and had to turn hundreds away.

Many of these people actually have some insurance, but their deductibles are too high to make going to a doctor feasible. One featured guy was a truck driver with health insurance whose deductible is $500; that's a good part of his take-home pay.

What the hell kind of society is this that it can't provide basic services (RAM pulled around 1,100 teeth, made a bunch of eyeglasses and did a lot of mammograms; no special MRI/CAT scans or things of that nature) to its citizens?

Posted by Linkmeister at March 3, 2008 09:19 AM | TrackBack
Comments

I'm so hoping that it will change. We're struggling with medical co-pays, air ambulance and prescription costs and we're thankful to be in this predicament because we actually have access to a doctor! There are many people who can't even get in to see a doctor at all here. And to top it off, HMSA is going to raise their rates for insurance coverage.

Posted by: ali at March 4, 2008 10:20 AM