And yet we can't agree on health care

[jenepel]

My brother just called me from the Emergency Room. They think he has appendicitis. He's getting a CT scan, and they will probably have to operate tonight.

He has no insurance. And yeah, that's stupid of him, and it's his own fault, yada yada. But, you know, he works in a restaurant, he earns like $15000 a year, and he's lived his entire life (bar the last three years) in a country where healthcare is free. He said he has looked into it, but he needed his health records from the UK and never kind of bothered to get them, and that it would be like $100 a month for the basic care, so he was putting it off. Stupid, yeah, but I get it. He's young, healthy, etc.

Fuck the fucking US health care system. He's looking at a $20000 bill for this operation, which means that my parents are looking at that bill (I guess) because it's not like he has the money. I can't even believe that you can go into a hospital and be sick through no fault of your own and have a necessary operation and it can freaking bankrupt you like that. It is so far out of my realm of experience that I will literally NEVER understand it.

I guess in a few years, if the new bill is good, he would have to get insurance, and it would be subsidised, because he must be low income. (And I think if I'm remembering right, that it starts at $40000 income and graduates down.)

BUT WHATEVER. Not like that helps him now. Hopefully he'll call back in a few hours and say the CT scan went alright (and cost him what, $2000 or so?) and that he doesn't need the operation. But it wasn't sounding good.

The ridiculous thing is that I should be thinking about how scary it is that he might be going in for an op like this, totally last minute, and all I can think of is the money. But $20000! That's terrifying. Fuck.

Comments

[outforawalk.livejournal.com]

Fuck. I am so sorry to hear surgery may be in his future. We are lucky here, because we can go to the med school. Which, yeah. They ARE practicing, but I had to have surgery the one year of my life I was uninsured and making like 6.00 an hour and I received terrific care and didn't have to pay a penny. (They offer low income people free/reduced care until about July when the budget runs out.) I can't imagine how hard it is for people who don't have an equivalent facility.

[jenepel.livejournal.com]

And now it's in his past! Got a call from his girlfriend at 7AM this morning saying he had it and it went well. I guess when it's an emergency they just do it.

I don't know about that med school thing - you would think Atlanta would be a big enough city for that option, but he also might just not know.