Guaranteed Healthcare Blog
Our Healthcare: Greed and Sleaze or Choice and Freedom
Posted by Donna Smith - S... on July 3, 2009 - 8:12am
By Donna Smith
Ah, Independence Day. We Americans love our freedom and our freedom to choose. But when it comes to our healthcare system, it seems we’ve forgotten that our choices are most limited and our freedom most restricted under the broken, for-profit, private health insurance model that has been outdoing itself on greed and sleaze for decades.
Kids, women, all non-white ethnic groups, seniors, sick folks – all of these groups have been among those discriminated against by the high-cost, high-profit U.S. healthcare system. Periodically when the abuses became just too egregious politically and socially, our government would struggle to put programs in place to address the disparities and quiet the storm. But profits must be paid under this system, and Americans are not free to choose either their doctors or their treatments when the bottom line is the top priority.
When I wrote a piece earlier this week about a $7 laboratory charge holding up blood work for my husband, I did not expect the outpouring of stories from other Americans who have experienced similar problems over small medical bills. From coast to coast and in every state of insurance, un-insurance, under-insurance and in poverty, in middle income or in wealth, it seems many of us have had our medical care interrupted and sometimes prevented by providers holding many of the keys to the kingdom of our healthcare system. Heart attack, cancer, bleeding disorders, stroke – none of these potentially life-threatening conditions have prevented patients from being asked for money before being treated.
Pictured above: The Wilkes family of Colorado (read on to learn more)
Patient Submitted Stories
Find out more about real people's stories struggling with the healthcare system.
Real People Denied Real Healthcare
ACCESS HEALTHCARE Features AHIP Protest - SF 06.19.08
Protesting for Single Payer Healthcare for ALLReal People DENIED Real Healthcare: Nathan Wilkes
Father/HR676 AdvocateReal People DENIED Real Healthcare: Carolyn Freeman
Virtual AssistantReal People DENIED Real Healthcare: Nataline Sarkisyan
17-year-old who died 12/20/07Real People DENIED Real Healthcare: Emily Cannon
Former TeacherReal People DENIED Real Healthcare: Juanita Anderson
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