Happy Friday, y’all!
Let's talk about Medicare and Medicaid, shall we?
A lot of folks are debating Medicare and Medicaid funding and some politicians have proposed radical changes to both programs. I’ve heard from advocacy groups representing the poor and seniors…but I haven’t seen interviews with groups representing a huge population that would be fucked over if Medicare and Medicaid are dismantled in favor of unproven reform-based fubarity – the disabled.
Longtime readers know that my sister and I are co-guardians for our older brother. My brother is autistic and relies on coverage from both Medicare and Medicaid.
He isn’t getting over or participating in a hustle…trust me.
Last year my brother’s primary care physician opted to no longer take patients with Medicaid, so I had the joy of trying to find another provider in a city where fewer and fewer doctors are seeing patients with Medicaid.
The reason behind a doctor’s decision to no longer accept Medicaid patients is clear – the program is slow to pay and doesn’t provide adequate coverage.
But that’s not what these politicians are trying to "fix."
Rather than address the issues within the program that would alleviate the burden placed on doctors and patients, these callous knaves seek only to slash funding.
And trust me on this too – funding is already lacking because of the issues within the program that are placing a burden on doctors and patients.
With another generation of autistic children becoming autistic adults, we can no longer afford for the disabled to remain unspoken for in this debate.
People like my brother are part of this equation...BIG TIME.
I’d love for policy folks to work on instilling some efficiency…something tells me that would also cut costs without cutting coverage.
But I’m not seeing that…I guess it would be too much like “right.”
Pause…sip coffee…continue.
As a guardian and an advocate I’m speaking this shit out into the universe – Medicaid isn’t a program for lazy freeloaders and Medicare isn’t a program for solvent retirees who could afford other coverage but opt not to.
This isn’t about stereotypes…this debate is real as hell for millions of Americans…and I’ll be damned if the spin takes out yet another program my brother needs because some motherfucker with political aspirations what’s to pander to his gleefully ignorant base.
We need to revise our definitions to include all the people who actually use these programs…
….because Medicare and Medicaid recipients reflect the kind of diversity Congress should.
Blink.
4 comments:
Did you see what Indiana is doing? I just wrote a paper about it for my Human Services class last week...
The largely Republican state government has taken it upon itself to stop funding Planned Parenthood as a service provider for anyone with Medicaid. Their reason for this is that they don't want state money to fund any place that performs abortions. OK - never mind the fact that Medicaid doesn't pay for abortions, BUT, now the feds are talking about pulling state funding for Medicaid. So basically, because the politicians do not want to fund abortions (which wasn't happening anyway), they will risk losing millions of dollars in federal funding for a million people who aren't getting publicly funded abortions. They would rather take away a low cost alternative for the people in between who cannot afford private insurance and who make too much for Medicaid. Never mind the fact that Planned Parenthood provides low cost birth control and screenings for other diseases and sickness, never mind that young women can go there for education about how to take care of themselves so that they may actually stay OFF of the welfare rolls and Medicaid systems in the future. They are doing this and trying to claim that it's about "states rights".
*snicker*
Like I said in the paper I wrote, this would surely be a matter of states rights if the money was all state tax money, but it isn't, it is federal money.
Not states rights at all, amazing example of the lack of separation of church and state though.
This morning I went to get blood drawn for a routine cholesterol test. I have insurance through my employer. My employer changed insurance companies last year and the hospital still had the old insurance company on file. The hospital had changed its computer system.
Time required for administrative processing - 20 minutes.
Time required to draw blood- 3 minutes.
These doctors get paid hundreds of dollars to see patients for 5 minutes. They need their money NOW!
There are callous MFers all over this issue.
I agree with you Sagacious. What are these doctors whining about? They earn a lot of money. The medicare problem should be focused on the welfare of the senior citizens.
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