a real life story from the nation: this person was not irresponsible, didn't skimp on benefits to buy a car or party and what happened? we are destroying our human capital as a society by not meeting the responsibility we have to each other for providing access to decent affordable universal health care.
:wakeneo:
i knew that my health insurance would run out shortly after i finished college, but i couldn't find any affordable options that provided more than catastrophic care. if the best i can get will only help in an emergency, i thought, what's the point of having any? faced with what was essentially a choice between insurance and food, i opted for food and hoped for the best. it was just bad luck that i got sick in january 2004, less than three weeks after my parent's insurance stopped covering me.
i waited for over a month to visit a doctor for tests, and i only went then because i was starting to feel too sick to work. it took two more months, multiple appointments, one visit to an emergency clinic, and four rounds of antibiotics to treat the infection that i had, although none of the physicians i saw ever gave me a specific diagnosis. on at least one occasion the doctor listened to my list of symptoms and wrote a prescription without doing any tests because she said they didn't want me to incur any unnecessary expenses.
in the end i spent nearly $3,500 on care and prescriptions between january and april, and another $1,500 in november and december when i got sick again. after struggling to avoid excessive student loans in college, i found myself with another school year's worth of debt. in many ways i'm lucky. i didn't need hospitalization, i don't have a chronic condition like diabetes, and my parents helped me with some of my bills. it is a testament to how broken the american health care system that i feel fortunate to not be financial ruined after my experience.
this substandard care takes a heavy toll: uninsured adults are 25 percent more likely to die prematurely than those with private health insurance. with the numbers of uninsured americans increasing, young people face the prospect of being sicker and less economically productive throughout their lives.immense economic benefits can be gained by making sure all americans have healthcare, somewhere between $65 and $130 billion dollars, even more significant when you take into account that the government spends approximately $30 billion annually to compensate healthcare providers for assisting the uninsured.
