Is it OK for someone to die because they don't have health insurance?

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My BIL has a complex condition requiring medication and the occasional open heart surgery to keep him alive. Care that you cannot get with just emergency room access. A birth defect, so it's always a 'preexisting condition'. If my sister ever is unable to get a job that will cover him with good, no preexisting condition health insurance - he will quite simply die.

He's far from the only one - from other complex medical conditions, to the simple issue of asthma patients who cannot get maintenance medications and have to wait until their life is in jeopardy to go to the emergency room for treatment - there are many people out there who will die without health insurance.

Is this OK?

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It's such a huge gap. You can be treated if you are in immediate life threatening danger - but that's too late for many conditions. And even then, you'll be billed into bankruptcy and homelessness - a great thing for someone already on the edge financially and recovering from whatever caused them to need the care in the first place.

[doctor_J]

He will not die due to lack of insurance coverage in the US. If your sister loses her job and his insurance coverage, and they have no or little income, he will qualify for Medicaid. If he has worked and paid SS taxes and becomes disabled he will also qualify for Medicare, regardless of age. The biggest threat is that they really would have to exhaust all savings and be basically destitue before qualifying for Medicaid. Once he does, he can get the best care in America. There is the danger that, if he is chronically ill, or requires open heart surgery and expensive life-long drugs, he may exhaust his major medical coverage with her employer. Then they still have income, but must use a lot of it to pay medical bills. This is how people are forced into bankruptcy. It's the people who work, but are not rich, who are in danger. The none working and those who have never worked are covered. They could lose everything before they qualify. It's a disgrace.

All county and state supported hospitals are required to offer charity care, if you apply for it and provide proof of no insurance and inability to pay. So he will not be denied. The danger is that your sister could work hard all her life and then wind up impoverished. Something has to be done about health care for the working middle class. The rich and ths indigent are taken care of well. If you work, and your insurance runs out, you are screwed. But you really don't have to worrry about him not receiving care.

[Details]

He will not die due to lack of insurance coverage in the US. If your sister loses her job and his insurance coverage, and they have no or little income, he will qualify for Medicaid. If he has worked and paid SS taxes and becomes disabled he will also qualify for Medicare, regardless of age. The biggest threat is that they really would have to exhaust all savings and be basically destitue before qualifying for Medicaid. Once he does, he can get the best care in America. There is the danger that, if he is chronically ill, or requires open heart surgery and expensive life-long drugs, he may exhaust his major medical coverage with her employer. Then they still have income, but must use a lot of it to pay medical bills. This is how people are forced into bankruptcy. It's the people who work, but are not rich, who are in danger. The none working and those who have never worked are covered. They could lose everything before they qualify. It's a disgrace.

All county and state supported hospitals are required to offer charity care, if you apply for it and provide proof of no insurance and inability to pay. So he will not be denied. The danger is that your sister could work hard all her life and then wind up impoverished. Something has to be done about health care for the working middle class. The rich and ths indigent are taken care of well. If you work, and your insurance runs out, you are screwed. But you really don't have to worrry about him not receiving care.So - a choice between being homeless (little or no income) and dead. Not that much better - she has to leave the job, and they have to move in with someone (thankfully for them it is an option) to qualify for Medicare, or get a divorce so she can keep working without it counting as his income. And any gap in that care, any time filing paperwork that coincides with a problem - and he's in trouble. I knew about Medicare - but not exactly an option - bankrupt themselves, do things that are bad for their children - which they'd do to save his life, but sure not a choice people should have to make. A disgrace, as you said.

This isn't hospital care - not all of it - he has medications he must take - and they must be monitored to see when they start killing his kidneys or liver (happened recently, which is why he's going in for a major procedure tomorrow on his heart - the drugs that stopped the arrhythmia were destroying his liver, the other possible drugs didn't work, so they have to destroy the parts of the heart causing it).

So - yeah - it's not quite a choice of health insurance or die - there's the third choice of don't work and lose everything so you are poor enough for Medicaid. More crappy choices from a system that is ridiculously dysfunctional. Because they want to work rather than live off the system, they're penalized.

[doctor_J]

Spoken like a real Right Winger. :thumbdown: So predictable.

mo

I am soooo NOT a right winger. I just gave some simple facts, none of which you can dispute. It was amusing though, never thought I'd be called a right winger,