Text 48635, 185 rader
Skriven 2007-03-16 18:11:10 av WAYNE CHIRNSIDE (1:10/345)
Ärende: medical coverage
========================
I am taking a brief sabatical from Fidonet due to minor health 
reasons so it is only fitting I leave on a medical note.

Today's topic from me is Medicare and what has happened to health care
in the  United States for the working middle class.

We all saw employer paid free dental start to go well before the current
adminstration but that is nothing to what has happened under Medicare
Part D with it's attendant *free* drug provision.

My Free drugs shot from $12 dollars a month to $41 a month *plus*
the approximately 200 dollar a year minimum before I qualified for my
*free*
drugs under Medicare Part D.

Thus when that provision passed I did *not* opt into Medicare part D
which in itself costs yet more which I've never actually bothered 
to figure in as my costs had already tripled.

Now had my medications cost $30 more a month I would have struck the 
"donut hole" you may have heard about.

That refers to the fact that you first have to meet the minimum, in my
case
$200 dollars before your drugs are *free*, plus 12 copay, plus my never
calculated
in additional Part D coverage added to my Medicare.

Now I wish to bring another small matter to all of your attention.
In addition to costing more, Medicare Part D drops coverage for many
previously covered procedures.

That is why physicians are no longer accepting many on Medicare Part D
and just incidentally why I never signed up for it.

You see I read and understood the Medicare Part D legislation *before* 
it was put into force as I read the legislation two months 
before it had the force of law.

What did you _get_ if you signed up for it?
You got vastly increased drug costs unless you fell into a very narrow
range
in the poor to middle  working class plus the coverage runs out with you
once
again having to pay full drug costs after it reaches maximimum coverage
often
in 6 months time.

Whoop de do.
Now it is true that the wealthy pay a higher deductable but nothing even
close to proportional to their relative income.
Then too the wealthy while paying roughly 300 percent more deductable
get virtually unlimited and uncapped health and medical insurance.
Not true for the lower and middle income, your coverage is capped and
runs out.

Yet further, once you sign into Medicare Part D the focus of medical
care switches from required procedures to deal with existing or
developing
illnesses it removes many of those covered procedures in favor
of the far cheaper preventative health care approach.

IOWs you are covered right up until the point you become ill if you
are sick then you _may_ be covered if coverage hasn't been withdrawn
for the particular illness you suffer from.
Unless you are rich of course in which case your increased
cost forless coverage helps to support the wealthy who pay proportionaly
vastly less.

Sounding better all the time isn't it?

Well here it gets good.
Well for me it does, maybe.
I say I understood Medicare Part D but it wasn't easy friends.
It took me two months of severe effort and headaches.

Then I arrived at the conclusion that by *not* signing up for 
Medicare Part D that actually thrust me to the head of the line 
with greater health care access at reduced cost to me.

See many procedures were not lost to me as I did not sign up
for Medicare Part D and thus I can get a doctor to treat me
for existing or developing conditions without them
]having to deal with all of Medicare Part D's limitation
and restrictions which often makes it easier and more economical 
for them to turn you away.

Thus I got to the head of the line.

Now the bestest best of all part.
With all of this happening there are some programs by the phamacutical
companies themselves that will assist me in paying for my drugs
at less cost than Medicare Part D, way less.

But I didd't sign up for it because I read it and understood it and did
not
want to pay for preventative health care at greater
cost when it would cost me my existing coverage of my existing medical 
problems.

Medicare Part D was about 4 times as difficult to understand than
learning The Linux
operating system and a whole lot less interesting or fun.

But now it shall pay off for me.

Boy all you Republicans out there really got sold a bill of goods didn't
you?
Then you thanked them for doing it to you not realizing what had
been done to you.

Whoa boy.

Makes me glad I only suffered a stroke last year and not the 
apparent congenital condition that made you think less services 
for more money was some kind of really swell idea and gift from the
government.

Also I need to check my Medicaid coverage I have never used in all the
time I
have had it as I got about 9 dollars toomuch on SDDI to qualify
for elligability for it.

That situation may very well have changed with the increased costs of
everything for which SSDI has not kept pace.
Sometimes it pays to pay attention to things as what seems too good to
be
true just maybe is and down the road a bit having paid a bit of
attention
just may one day pay off.

Remember the war the oil was going to pay for?
Now which party was it that sold you on both hte war that the oil would
pay for
while removing our best troops, special forces and intelligence
from afganistan where the Taliban and Al Qaeda were to Iraq where they
were not?

No President in the history of the United States has ever cut taxes
heading into or during a time of war but for one as wars you may be 
surprised and shocked to hear actually *cost* a great deal of money.

Guess which President cut taxes as he took us to war?

Well, I am off to more constructive pursuits for a time.
It's about time I got my seizure medication and saw a physician 
about this headache  I have had since last June.

Now that I've gotten the immediate things that had required 
attention out of the way.
Moving, getting settled and caught up on bills.

I haven't actually seen a doctor or received medical services
since 1995.

Now I have to locate a doctor and actually communicate or his
receptionist
I wasn't taken in by Medicare Part D and thus am covered for most
of the procedures I require.
I expect just getting that across to them to be just a bit difficult
as so many bought into the scam that was and remains Medicare Part D.

Should you decide to read that legislation for yourselves I wish you the
very best of luck in trying to figure it out as it sure
looks to me like it was designed intentionally to obfuscate.

I've been told lawyers with exerience in the medical field have a tough
time
with it.
Which again makes it too much effort for many to slog through the 
necessary paperwork to actually receive needed treatment.

I was actually going to hang this up this morning however this day went
quite a bit better than I had anticipated.

I leave you to other competent hands and some friends among them

Try to give them a listen will you?
You might actually learn something if you give it a try.
Nothing ventured nothing gained they say.



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