Quote:
Originally Posted by SuckOnThis
About 20 years ago one of my best friends was diagnosed with bone cancer when he was 26. He HAD insurance and went through almost a year of hell with surgery, chemo, etc. Then after about 10 months he got a letter from the insurance company telling him that he had reached the cap on the policy and they were no longer covering anything. His parents ended up borrowing money against their house to pay for his continued treatment but that money only lasted a few months. He ended up dying in his parents basement with no medical care whatsoever with the little amount of morphine his parents could pay for. The hospital didnt continue treatment and say pay us when you can, they told him he was out of luck. They will only treat someone enough to stabilize them then they are on their own.
|
This is one of the primary problems with out system.
60% of bankruptcies in this country are due to medical bills and most of those people have health insurance. Health insurance companies employee people that whose only job is to figure out how to deny your claim and they get bonuses based on the denial rate. Or, like your friend they go over the cap.
Emergency care will cover you for a minute, but for something major like cancer if you can't pay they don't treat you.
Obamacare does get rid of the caps which would have helped in his situation, but I feel it is just step 1 in what will eventually become a nationwide single payer system.