Guaranteed Healthcare

I was with a wonderful man for 15 years who had progressed to 4th- stage lung cancer that had spread to his brain and liver before diagnosis. He worked in non-union construction and though he put away for retirement and saved money, being quite frugal, he was so healthy, meaning a resting heart rate of 60 and 100% blood oxygenation, he took the gamble that paying for healthcare was not worth the cost.

The gamble didn't pay off, but then again I am not sure an insurance company would have honored their obligations in the final year of keeping him alive with his terminal condition. He was expected to live 3 months, but with chemo and pain management lasted a full year. In the meantime he burned through his savings and endlessly worried about if we would lose the house when he was forced to go on public assistance. That's what bothered me the most -- that a dying man should be having to worry about money every day of his final days instead of preparing himself for death and the hope of resting in peace.

A year later a friend with supposed coverage died of breast cancer while fighting her insurance company to pay for medications. In a sense we were blessed and he went to a nonprofit hospital that had a charity program and allowed him to pay off the mortgage and leave me the house before he died. I am a disabled individual who has full coverage from a combination of Medicare and state provided Medicaid. I struggle financially and with grief, but at least have a roof over my head, unlike so many that go through such passages in this destructive system.

To all of you struggling and feeling alone, know you are not. The only way out is to get the insurance and profit out of the system and help people to go to the doctor before they reach the moment of no return.

Thank you for your advocacy for a healthier, more compassionate system. Kate McClellan