Begging To Be Saved
Find a Conversation
| Mon, 10-05-2009 - 10:09am |
As I sit here this morning with both my arms aching from the rheumatoid arthritis I suffer from, I read stories like this and live in fear that one day I may be unable to work. I may not be able to type anymore or lift things, or the arthritis may move to other parts of my body. What will I do? Even worse, what will happen to me if I can't work and get another illness - like cancer?
If this things can happen to a young person and they struggle and die from lack of care, how will I make it as an unemployed and uninsured 50 or 60 year old? It scares me to death.
Uninsured And Sick, Student Begged For His Life
Freddie Effinger started feeling what he called a "bizarre pain" in his upper thigh during the summer of 2007, just before his third year at the University of Alabama law school. After a scan, his doctors told him it was probably some sort of mass, nothing serious, and that they would remove it surgically in September.
Effinger, then 23, didn't have insurance. His parents' policy dropped him after college, and he had figured he could coast through three years of law school and land a job with benefits before suffering any catastrophic illness or injury. ("Superman Complex," he calls it.) The operation to remove the mass would only cost him about $1,200.
But when they operated, Effinger's doctors discovered something more serious.
"The tumor was the same size as my hand," Effinger told the Huffington Post. "And directly underneath that tumor was another tumor, and further down my leg was another tumor."
The following month, an oncologist told Effinger he had advanced stage lymphoma. The oncologist told him that his chemotherapy could cost tens of thousands of dollars per session, and that he would need 12 sessions. Effinger panicked.
"My mom's a schoolteacher and my dad's a juvenile detention officer," Effinger said. "They're good people, but that's not going to happen."
Effinger scrambled for insurance. He said he was told that the school's health plan for students wouldn't have adequately covered chemotherapy treatment at the nearby University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital. He had no luck on the private insurance market outside the university.
"After making a couple calls explaining the situation, it was pretty much discussions of blackout periods and 'We wouldn't be able to do it,'" he said. "And it was frustrating and frightening."
Staff at the hospital, St. Vincent's East in Birmingham, Ala., came up with a solution. "I spoke to someone at the hospital and they mentioned there's a certain number of patients a year they grant charity to," he said. He was eligible because he had zero income. He was indigent.
"They called me that later that day and told me they would grant me 100 percent charity. I broke down in tears. Somebody told me they were going to let me live. It was an amazing feeling."
Effinger finished up chemo and got married in July 2008. He even managed to finish law school on time and score a job with an employment law firm in Birmingham.
But Effinger is still on the hook for about $9,000 for other parts of his treatment. (That's on top of $100,000 in student loan debt, but, he said, "at least the student loan people are being cool" by comparison; debt collectors harassed him over the medical bills.) His credit is wrecked.
And the warm, fuzzy feeling Effinger got from the kindness at the hospital was tempered by the realization that he had to beg to survive, that he owed his life to charity and had added considerably to his debt all the same. He's become an advocate for health insurance reform, going door to door for Organizing for America.
"I'm a pretty humble guy, but it's really demoralizing to have to beg a hospital for your life, to be to be able to be treated for this thing you just found out that you had," he said. "I don't just have a right to be healthy? I have to beg for it? I have to show that I am poor? It's frustrating. It's embarrassing. It's really unacceptable."


((But Effinger is still on the hook for about $9,000 for other parts of his treatment. (That's on top of $100,000 in student loan debt, but, he said, "at least the student loan people are being cool" by comparison; debt collectors harassed him over the medical bills.) His credit is wrecked. ))
Sorry, but something is a miss here.
"Effinger, then 23, didn't have insurance. His parents' policy dropped him after college, and he had figured he could coast through three years of law school and land a job with benefits before suffering any catastrophic illness or injury."
So Mommy and Daddy couldn't take care of him any more, and according to some we shouldn't expect him to take care of himself.
"He never had to "beg" the hospital for treatment. He just begged to get somebody else to pay for it."
OPM is always the best way to get stuff. Many of our current health care reform proponents think this is the way for everyone to obtain medical care.
I think there are better cases of people who need health insurance and don't get it. He chose to go to law school and then turn down his insurance. There was nothing about whether he could afford it or not. I've known people who have, because they're young and think they're healthy, turned down the basic premiums that they could afford. I paid for health insurance when I was in grad school and I know people, with the same TA salary who turned it down. It wasn't cost prohibitive but it did mean cutting back on other expenses. He's going to law school and gambled on his health. If health care were offered to all, he'd still have to pay--it's not going to be free for everyone. I do feel bad for him, as I do for anyone who has a serious disease.
I'd much rather have people hear about the mother who goes to the food pantry where I help out who has cancer and three children, lost her husband to cancer a few years ago and because she recently lost her job, can't get health care because of her preexisting condition. Yeah, cobra arguments can be made but if you've lost your job and have three children to feed, that's put off. There are many needy people out there.
I have one of those "young people" at home who can't afford insurance because insurance companies consider him a "high risk".
I don't have a problem with insurance companies, per se. They provide a service for those who fit the criteria and can afford it.