Subject: ER Doctor's Letter To The Editor
I think this M.D. has hit the nail on the head with his observation.
Doctor's letter to the editor
Many wish this was an article on the front page of every newspaper in America ---
I know that there are similar incidents in the ER of all hospitals......
This letter appeared in the Jackson , Mississippi Clarion-Ledger dated August 23rd
Dear Sirs:
During my last night's shift in the ER, I had the pleasure of evaluating a patient with a shiny new gold tooth, pierced tongue, multiple elaborate tattoos, a very expensive brand of tennis shoes and a new cellular telephone equipped with her favorite R&B tune for a ringtone.
Glancing over the chart, one could not help noticing her payer status: Medicaid.
She smokes more than one costly pack of cigarettes every day and, somehow, still has money to buy beer.
And our president expects me to pay for this woman's health care? Our nation's health care crisis is not a shortage of quality hospitals, doctors or nurses. It is a crisis of culture - a culture in which it is perfectly acceptable to spend money on pleasures and vices while refusing to take care of one's self or, heaven forbid, purchase health insurance. A culture that thinks "I can do whatever I want to because someone else will always take care of me."
STARNER JONES, MD
Jackson, MS
Posts
16 comments:
If her insurance status is Medicaid then taxpayers are already paying for her medical care, duh. This email writer doesn't seem smart enough to be an MD.
He is, indeed, a doctor.
http://spotlight.vitals.com/2009/10/dr-roger-starner-jones-muses-crisis-culture/
More teabagger bunkum. This is in line with Sainted Ronaldus Magnus and the cadillac welfare queens.
It's possible there are people out there like this, but the reality is that such folks represent such a tiny minority of our population, that it's not worth discussing.
My vote would be that this Doc made it up. Teabaggers and their corporate overlords and their C Street masters have no problem lying early and often to sell their "convictions" to their easily led and duped base.
I call b.s. on this one.
I had an aquaintance whose company paid her insurance premiums. The Dr. co-pays were $25 per visit, prescriptions were about the same. She wouldn't use the insurance--why? she could go to the emergency room for free! It was worth 4 or 5 hours of her time to save that $50. So yes, there are deadbeats who can figure out a way around the system and feel entitled to do so. But they are getting away with it RIGHT NOW! We need an insurance plan where everyone pays something, and no one has to die to learn from their bad choices.
Anyone who would go to the emergency ward to avoid a minimal fee is a bit, uh, nutty (no offense). I can't help but believe such instances are rare, and anyway, the ER won't always treat you now, if your symptoms/medical issues aren't serious enough.
Agree that the system needs to be changed, but whining about rip-offs is stupid. We will never get away from some people figuring out how to beat the system, so deal with it.
If even one person abuses a system provided for the common good, then we must deny all Americans that service. No exceptions. The hundreds or thousands of dollars that woman cost our $13 trillion economy outweighs any benefit for the sick, starving, or homeless.
This doctor passed medical school and thinks that the treatment in the ER, paid for by taxpayers, is better than affordable health care?
Sounds like he won't be satisfied until hospitals turn people like her away at gunpoint and let her die in the street.
And man, that ringtone of hers might have set her back as much as $2.50. Think of how many mammograms she could have bought herself with that!
As a doctor, doesn't he deal with patients, every single day, who get denied compensation from their insurance companies, or who lose coverage with their jobs? Don't all doctors at some point fudge paperwork or do things on the sly just to work around insurance companies to get patients what they need?
Yes, people will abuse the system. But if means one parent out there doesn't dread calling an ambulance for their kid because of the cost, I think it will be worth it.
Shorter version: Minorities suck.
LOL - the last Anonymous hit it on the head - Minorities suck!
Funny how America's horrible "welfare queens" never seem to have southern accents, shiney pickup trucks with pricey gun racks, confederate flag tattoos, or their favorite country music ring tones, isn't it?
The story of the quite possibly non-white person living in the lap of luxury on taxpayers' money is a classic fairytale. Versions of this particular tale have been recorded all over the world.
Indeed, Celia, there was some article a few years back in the Wall Street Journal (before Murdoch bought it) with some nonsense about teh poors being "lucky ducks" because they paid such low, low taxes, and how that was a real bad thing for pitiful rich people, who were somehow incredibly ripped off by this unfair taxation system.
It would've been mind-blowing except the conservatives have pushed the Overton Window over so far that crap like that begins to seem normal unfortunately.
"She wouldn't use the insurance--why? she could go to the emergency room for free! It was worth 4 or 5 hours of her time to save that $50. So yes, there are deadbeats who can figure out a way around the system and feel entitled to do so."
I can't decide if this is a spoof or grade A bullshit.
Well, as if rich WHITE rightwingers never "beat" the system. I know quite a few wealthy lawyers who get paid in cash under the counter, and then "readjust" their income/earnings in order to pay less taxes.
But, Oh MY!, I forgot: it was a rich WHITE person who did, and anyway IOKIYAR!
There will always be people who figure out ways to beat the system. The trick is that the rightwing has brainwashed these idiots to focus on teh poors who "beat" the system, which costs almost nothing in the scheme of things.
But rich people beating the system tends to have a bigger impact. But money talks! And wingtards are mezmerized by the b.s.
As a single unemployed (but still looking) mom of three this article got my attention. I have a special needs child who does recieve ssi/medicaid for her meds, and currently her monthly ssi checks and my child support combined total less than $800 a month for a family of 4. I have applied several times for medical help and it never fails... I do not have car payments or gold dripping off of any of us or gold teeth. I'm just a simple "country" mom who gets turned down. As one of us gets sick or hurt and are seeking medical help, I see someone who fits this Dr's discription and it makes me angry that they have everything handed to them and feel others owe it to them. So I comend him on speaking out on this problem we are facing.
@ anon mom
This letter is either fake or highly fictionalized.
I hope comprehensive health care reform passes soon, because then you and you family could never be denied coverage by an insurance company again and there will be subsidies to help you purchase health care or get it through your employer.
Also, if there really are free loaders like the fictional person in this "letter", they'll no longer be allowed to behave in this way. They'll have to buy insurance or pay a fine if they don't. Its just a shame that obstructionists who claim to represent "real" Americans don't really give a damn about real people and their troubles.
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