Losing Health Care

Share

Last night, I reached into the mailbox and pulled out a letter from the state health provider. Inside, the letter informed me that the company that has provided coverage to state employees in the PPO network has dropped the state as a client. I am honestly not really surprised. In fact, I’m surprised they haven’t cut our hours yet to save having to provide health care. I am not sure I wouldn’t have done the same thing.

Many state workers are a huge risk. Under the new provisions of Obamacare, it would probably be prohibitively expensive to continue taking on this risk when so many other things MUST be covered under federal health law. They cover things for us that shouldn’t be covered and don’t really cover the things I need like optometry. Many state workers are in poor health, overweight, have bad habits, and I suspect that they seek state employment so that other people will take care of them. Our retirement benefits are enticing but outrageous, and if I owned a health insurance company, I would probably drop us too.

You see, the real problem here is getting care. Obamacare is a huge misnomer because it isn’t about care; it’s about coverage. We’ll eventually find someone to cover us, and the price will probably skyrocket, but that doesn’t mean they will cover us well or that we’ll get the care we like, want, or think we “deserve”. If they would allow it, because I’m in good health, I’d take the money and save it for a rainy day, but they are using young and healthy people like me to subsidize other people in state service, many of whom die or become disabled while still working. God only knows what the 70 year olds are doing who still work with us; many of them shuffle around and can barely see or lift anything, and so I don’t know why they are still here. Likewise, Obamacare “covers” the young to force them to pay into the health exchanges to cover the older people who need the treatments, but most of the money will disappear in the bureaucracy.

I laughed a little to read the letter last night because now I am part of the story. I heard stories over the past few weeks about companies dropping businesses or raising rates, and I wondered if and when we would see the same thing. It was really a question of when. Our bureaucracy is so bloated in Nevada with people we do not need or people who do not perform valuable work that perhaps this lack of “benefits” will drive people out into other fields. At least I can hope.

Most of my life, I have maintained that too many people draw on healthcare, but that’s not new either. Even in the days of “Pollyanna”, many people thought doctors were just pills and bills, and yet we go there for every sniffle, scratch and symptom, real or psychosomatic. I just read today that I’m in a minority because I’m part of the 30% of the population that uses ZERO prescription drugs. I have never been more thankful for good health than I am now as I move into my prime, because as it becomes less available I am less likely to necessitate a visit to a physician. Eventually, availability will become so low that they will have no choice but to tell you that you don’t qualify because the return on the effort is so low, and since it won’t be your call even if you’re willing to pay, you may suffer or even die. We are losing our health care. The money they are spending on exchanges isn’t even going to health- it’s a slush fund for liberal groups intended to help establish one party rule, as if life would be better if we all thought the same way. Apparently novels like Ender’s Game, 1984, and The Giver failed to resonate. Just take a pill and relax, it will all be over soon.