The plural of anecdote IS data [part 1]

I've grown tired of that stoopid shibboleth: the plural of anecdote is not data. But I have grown even more tired of that other shibboleth: health care rationing. Just try to get good hard data on that from insurance companies. Pretty much leaves us with just anecdotes to analyze.

I, for one, do not believe we'd have a serious rationing problem if we went to single-payer universal health care. But if we did, I'd much rather the rationing get decided based on my fellow citizens' health care needs or even on a first-come-first-served basis outside of emergencies. I do not consider it right that rationing be based on the profit margins of corporations.

Besides, I'm old enough [just barely!] to remember when doctors were the medical experts, not accountants. I'm also old to remember when insurance companies really and truly sold you insurance, rather than just bet with you on the state of your health and then welsh on their bets. I'd really, really, really like to go back to that era. I'd even be happy with high-deductible, major-medical, guaranteed-coverage, for-profit insurance. That guaranteed coverage is a sticker though. This country has already gone way far past the point where we hold corporations to the same standard of responsibility that we demand of the fellow in the street.

Speaking of insurance company profits, check out the Industry: Health Care: Insurance & Managed Care Fortune 500 list for 2007.



So, anyways, excuse the tangential rant, back on topic: rationing. Anybody who doesn't think we already have rationing right now, here, today, in the good ol' US of A, hasn't been paying attention. Some of the forms that rationing takes:

• waiting periods for coverage


• partial coverage with none for pre-existing conditions


• complete refusal of coverage because of particular conditions, past or present [asthma, once had anti-depressants prescribed, had cancer, ...]


• not to mention deciphering all the gobbledygook in the fine print, which basically leaves them lots of weasel room when deciding how much of any one charge for any one service they will pay for [and argue with you about till you decide it's easier or cheaper to pay it yourself].


• [add your example here]

Data to be updated periodically*

[compilation of anecdotes]

• pregnancy, followed by baby with rare genetic disorder [more examples in the comments]


• video interviews [4 so far] of people who have been denied health care


• a loophole [soon to be closed?]


• Sticker shock -- Twisty can afford can afford to pay for the cancer drugs that her insurance won't cover, but few of us could


• Suspicious breast lump? Sorry, go away.


• Lose your job, your money, your house when you get cancer. Oh yeah, and you'll never be able to get insurance again. [1st comment, by Spinning Liz]


• Moral of this story: Don't get old. [the long-term care insurance industry is just as good for you as the health insurance industry]


• Bob Herbert would start with guaranteed coverage for all kids, but he's still looking like a pro-corporatist shill here [thanks, syd]


• Using ethically questionable methods to sell "privatized Medicare" [Medicare-replacement insurance] to the elderly, then hitting them with high costs, such as huge co-pays [and not all doctors accept these plans either]


• “Actually, I was going to become one of the 45 million uninsured for the summer,” she said. “The think tank does not provide insurance for ‘temporary’ employees, and my school did not allow extension of health insurance post-graduation. I still haven’t found a reasonably priced insurance plan for this period.”
  
  Aaaaargh! When a newly minted doctor investigating Americans’ access to medical care has no insurance — then you know that our health care system is truly bankrupt. [quoting Kristof becuase I'm too lazy to condense it for you]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]


• [this space to be filled at a later date]

* I'm much better at starting projects than keeping up with them. If you didn't already know that, you haven't been paying attention.