I Hate Dialysis Message Board
Dialysis Discussion => Dialysis: News Articles => Topic started by: okarol on February 21, 2007, 09:18:39 AM
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Prisoner Of Medicaid
Written by Brandon Daviet
2-14-07
I read a lot, in many ways I devour books in the same way a starving dog would devour meat. I also exercise a lot. Sure it's good for you and that's part of the motivation, but I have really developed both of these habits for another reason: I am a prisoner and it helps pass the time.
No, I didn't kill or molest anybody. I didn't embezzle somebody's hard earned pension. I'm a prisoner of a different kind, there are no bars keeping me locked up and away from society. In fact, my only crime is being disabled and being on Medicaid; so far I have done a thirty-one year stretch, with no possibility of parole in sight, and in many ways I can relate to the convicts that sit in their jail cells with no hope for the future.
You may read this and say to yourself that I am being melodramatic and just feeling sorry for myself. While it's true I've never been in prison, I use the comparison to illustrate, and simplify, my points to those that don't understand the plight of the disabled who are dependent on America's Medicaid system.
Without going into great detail I will lay out the basics of my situation. I was born with congestive heart failure, specifically Mitral Artresia, and spent the first eighteen years of my life on a strict regimen of medications and doctor visits. Shortly after graduating high school I started having heart attacks and was lucky enough to receive a heart transplant that gave me a new lease on life.
In 2003, most likely as a result of the daily immunosuppressant I take to prevent the rejection of my transplant, I was diagnosed and treated successfully for thyroid cancer. What this has all added up to is a frequent, continual cycle of health care that has all been paid for by taxpayer money and little of it by me or my family, as being on Medicaid exempts you from paying taxes. This is why I feel like a prisoner in my own skin and often like a burden on society.
Most of my feelings of imprisonment come not from being disabled; in fact at times it's proved a blessing. I say that because I've always had a strong empathy for others who have been discriminated against because of the color of the skin or for their religious and personal beliefs. Rather, I feel imprisoned by the rules of the Medicaid system and its failure to let me shoulder my fair share of my health care costs.
This is because to receive Medicaid, and the expensive medical services that keep me alive, I am limited to an income of less than $100.00 dollars a month. There are also numerous rules about owning property and assets that Medicaid uses to justify need. While It's realistic to say that I could never afford the costs on my own, and I am grateful to Medicaid for keeping me alive, I am incensed that I'm not allowed to do my part to support myself.
In 2006 my personal income was $7,236; this is the total amount of the monthly Social Security Income checks I received in 2006. In addition, I receive less than $100 dollars a month in food stamps. This puts me just below the 2006 poverty line of $9,800 dollars for a single person household. Conversely, just in the last six months of 2006, Medicaid spent $53,412 dollars on my health care.
This amount, as pointed out by in a letter from Hollie Stevenson of the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Finance, may not reflect all the money spent as "some claims may still be unsettled." It dumbfounds me that the government is willing to spend this much money on keeping me alive, while at the same time refusing me the chance to earn an honest living that would allow me to pay a decent portion of my health costs.
Any sociologist worth their salt will tell you that studies have shown there are well-researched, direct correlations between mortality rates and income. As income rises so dose one's overall health. That considered, it is clear that the current Medicaid system is actually making the problem worse instead of better by keeping the disabled well below the poverty line. Sociologists would also tell you that by not being allowed to work people are missing out on a fundamental element of socialization.
I bring these things up because I want anyone who is reading this, and working hard just to make a living for yourself and your family, to be outraged at having to foot the lions-share of expenses for my well being. I also implore any politicians that read this to be outraged at the collective inefficiency of government that has caused this moronic protocol of health care to exist for so many years.
I want child-molesters, terrorists and drug dealers off the streets as much as any other true American. I am convinced, after years of weighing the situation, that we would have more resources to devote to these things if we simply lifted the earning limitations on the disabled and allowed them the chance to be contributors to this great, if somewhat misdirected country.
I've always lived my life by the directions of a strong moral compass. Yet, as desperation and financial despair sink in, the compass is losing its power to point me in the right directions. If you want to know what a cry for help sounds like; this is it.
URL http://blogcritics.org/archives/2007/02/13/022818.php
Brandon's MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/newdealers
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Yeah, it just doesn't make sense. That's why some people stay on welfare, they try to work, to EARN money, and they get screwed for it.