[Vision2020] Uninsured adults 25 percent more likely to die

[Tom Hansen]

The best health care program that I am aware of is the one to which I am a 
part of . . . Tri-Care.

I pay no premiums.  Yet, I have been a member since July of 1989.  The 
most I have ever paid for a medical prescription is $9.00 (and that was 
only once).

In June of 2006, my spouse was hospitalzed at Gritman (10 days in ICU and 
14 days in CCU).  The total bill came to over $45,000 of which I paid 
$1,200 out of pocket.

A couple years before that I was hospitalized with a double hernia.  The 
total bill on that came to approximately $12,000 of which I paid $600 out 
of pocket.

Not only that, but after my spouse was discharged from Gritman, TriCare 
informed me that we had satisfied the "deductible" portion of our annual 
health care cycle.  As such, subsequent prescriptions (through the 
remainder of the fiscal year) were FREE.

"Where can I sign up for such a great health care program?" you ask.

Quite simple, Arnold.  It is a simple two-step process.

1)  Enlist into military service.

2)  Retire from military service.

"Oh, no, Tom.  I am too old to enlist," you say.

No, you're not, Donnie-boy.

Thanks to the Department of Defense lowering the standards for entry into 
military service, coupled with an extended 20-year retirement age (from 55 
to 62), you can sign up Monday.

I'll be going over to the mall later today, Donnie-boy.  Should I stop by 
the recruiter's office and have them pencil yo uin for 9:00 Monday?

Tom-Tom Handson
Moscow, Idaho



> Keely,
>    
>   I don't need to see the impacts of not having insurance, I experience 
it. I don't need a
government study to tell me that not having medical care causes poor 
health. That is a no
brainer.
>    
>   What we need are either no government subsidies for doctors and 
hospitals that charge
$300 an hour, or we need tighter regulation of how much a doctor can 
charge when he/she is
working in a tax supported building who got their degree on a tax 
supported education. 
>    
>   No reasonable person honestly thinks he or she is worth $300 an hour. 
That is
ridiculous. Nobody can afford that unless you are rich.
>    
>   Health insurance companies discriminate extensively, limit coverage 
more extensively,
and charge far more than the below average income person can afford. 
>    
>   The other problem with health insurance companies is that they charge 
monthly, and poor
people cannot always afford to pay each month. 
>    
>   But I say, what is the point of getting insurance, it doesn't cover 
anything most people
need. I just cannot get health insurance for anything I really need. 
>    
>   We would be better off banning health insurance for everyone, then 
trying to get
everyone to have it. Then Doctors and Hospitals would be forced to charge 
reasonable rates
that an open and free market could afford,  or have zero clients trying to 
charge $6000 a
visit. It is only because the government has legalized exploitation of the 
people that
Hospitals and Doctors can exploit people that are sick, injured, or in 
need or care. And I
won't even get into the Health Insurance Companies, or the pharmaceutical 
companies that
seem to invent illnesses to sell their legalized drug pushing. 
>    
>   Now what they do is charge is $4000 an hour and come down on the price 
for those that
have health insurance, even less is they have medicaid or medicare.
>    
>   Hospitals destroy poor people everyday financially because those 
without health
insurance cannot afford the higher rates that Hospitals and Doctors charge 
people that
cannot afford health coverage. I think it highly immoral to charge the 
poor that cannot
afford health insurance a higher rate than then wealthier people that can 
afford health
insurance for the EXACT same service. And I cannot see why Liberals in 
Moscow support that
policy, that even Gritman holds.
>    
>   Best Regards,
>    
>   Donovan
>    
>   
> 
> keely emerinemix <kjajmix1 at msn.com> wrote:
>       .hmmessage P  {  margin:0px;  padding:0px  }  body.hmmessage  {  
FONT-SIZE: 10pt; 
FONT-FAMILY:Tahoma  }    Goodness, "Donovan," you sound more and more like 
a Courtney-ite
Libertarian every day.  
> 
> I'm sorry that you fail to see that while all of us die, the poor among 
us die earlier of
things that generally don't kill the rich among us.  I don't know what's 
more pitiful --
that you can't see that, or that you don't give a damn.
> 
> Keely
> 
> 
> 
> 
>     
> ---------------------------------
>   Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 20:05:07 -0700
> From: donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com
> To: nickgier at adelphia.net; vision2020 at moscow.com
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Uninsured adults 25 percent more likely to die
> 
>   Interesting study because I always thought we all had an equal chance 
of dying, 100%.
>    
>    
>   Best Regards,
>    
>   Donovan
> 
> nickgier at adelphia.net wrote:
>   Families USA Study Shows How Many Die Because They Lack Health 
Insurance - 03/26/08,
Workers Independent News
> 
> A first-ever report breaks down the death rate of the uninsured state-by-
state, and finds
that the uninsured are more likely to die sooner than the insured. Jesse 
Russell reports:
> 
> Families USA has finished the first-ever study breaking down state by 
state how many die
every year due to a lack of health insurance. So far the organization has 
completed
studies in 13 of the 50 states, and on Tuesday held a conference call 
regarding the
results in Wisconsin. According to Families USA, 10.7 percent of those 
between the ages of
25 and 64 living in Wisconsin are uninsured and they estimate that 
approximately 250
Wisconsinites died in 2006 due to being uninsured. Dr. Barbara Horner-
Ibler, medical
director at the Bread of Healing Clinic in Milwaukee said that it isn’t 
just a problem
of the uninsured, but also of insurance holders with deductibles that are 
too high:
> 
> [Horner-Ibler]: "We also have the issue now of not just the uninsured, 
but patients who
have high deductible plans who are delaying care because they do not have 
access and the
access that they do have is much too expensive for them to be able to 
afford on their
budget."
> 
> According to the study, which covered 30 years of statistics, uninsured 
adults are more
than three times as likely to delay seeking medical care and are 25 
percent more likely to
die prematurely than adults with health insurance.
> 
> 
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"People who ridicule others while hiding behind anonymous monikers in chat-
room forums are neither brave nor clever." 

- Latah County Sheriff Wayne Rausch (August 21,
2007)

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