Why This Election Matters to People With Diabetes

The media are touting the "good" news that the rate of uninsured in this country dropped to "only" 47.7 million people.

I don't know about you, but 47,700,000 people looks like a lot of folks to me. Especially when you realize that many of them are the people who most need health coverage--people in their 40s who have lost good professional jobs and may never find anything but part time work without benefits, people who because they have a preexisting condition, like cancer, or asthma cannot buy health insurance no matter how much money they have. And, of course, many, many people with diabetes.

There are heartrending stories all over the blogs of people with diabetes who have lost their jobs and with it not only their health insurance but their ability to buy health insurance on their own. I get mail from Type 1s who cannot afford test strips. I get mail from Type 1s who have to choose between insulin or being homeless.

There is a feeble so-called "safety net" in our system, but what most people don't realize until they lose a job is that if you own any assets--a college fund for your child, a home, the savings you have accumulated to tide you over until you find that next job, you won't qualify for that safety net. If you have any equity in your home or any savings, if you have a health crisis without insurance you are SOL.

The system we have in the U.S. today expects you to spend every dollar you have on your health expenses before it will offer you any help. Then, to add to the unfairness of the system, drug companies and hospitals charge FAR MORE to people without insurance for every prescription, treatment, hospitalization, and doctor's visit than they charge to those with insurance.

The insurers can bargain down the price of test strips. The day you lose your insurance, you will pay the full $103/100. Insurers have certain insulins they will pay for at a lower copay because they have negotiated discounts with the pharmaceutical companies. But if you are paying for that same insulin they pay $50 for, you will pay $83. It's the same for all the rest of your prescriptions.

Conditions are not all that much better for many people who technically HAVE insurance and don't show up in that 47.7 million "unemployed" figure. Over the past 8 years, insurance plans have cut back drastically on what they will cover while raising the copays for everything. Where I used to pay $5 for each prescription, I now pay a $50 for each vial of insulin I buy. Where a doctor appointment with my PCP used to be free and then rose to $5 it is now $20. Lab tests used to be fully covered. Now there is a $500 copay before my insurer will pay for a single lab test. And that is after I pay a monthly insurance premium that is a lot more than I used to pay for monthly rent when I was in my 30s.

Still, I am one of the very lucky ones. I can buy health insurance despite a diabetes diagnosis, because I live in the great state of Massachusetts where Liberals have made it against the law to refuse insurance to anyone because they have a pre-existing condition and where a liberal legislature, disgusted with our Federal government's refusal to do anything about health care, passed a landmark law two years ago (despite then-Governor Romney's opposition to it) that offered coverage to all and dramatically raised the number of insured in our state. We could all do with a bit more of that kind of liberalism. Texas, that bastion of conservatism,, now has the highest rate of people without health insurance of any state in the union.

And that is why this election matters.

The Republicans will tell you they are going to do something about health care. But they had complete control of congress, the White House and the courts for six year, and throughout that period they did nothing about changing the way our health care system works except to attempt to ban the import of cheaper pharmaceutical drugs from Canada and to set up a Medicare drug benefit for the elderly that explicitly banned Medicare from negotiating with drug companies for better prices. Their plan was a huge gift to the pharmaceutical companies and big insurers. It was a tragic rip off of America's older population.

The Republicans appointed people to the FDA who had contempt for science and used ideology to approve or disapprove drugs. FDA leaders with strong financial ties to the drug companies repeatedly approved dangerous drugs over the protests of the experts whose advice they are supposed to rely on. Throughout the years of Republican rule, drug company lobbyists have gotten everything they have asked for. The American people, well, they get what trickles down. [Supply your own barnyard image here.]

Wrapping themselves in the banner of "religions faith" the Republicans have done all they could to block the stem cell research that could lead to Type 1 diabetes cures. They have cut way back on all funding for the basic research that might heal all of us.

So they've had their chance. The Republicans will make the usual election year promises but over the past eight years they've shown you what their priorities are and whose bidding they will serve if they get back into power.

And because they can't point to their record, or offer you a real health plan solution, their current campaign relies not on ads that explain their positions to your or describe the policies they will follow. Instead they are trying to distract your from the real issues at stake in this election by bombarding you with smear ads, silly insult ads, and downright lie ads, intended to work on your emotions, frighten you, and to making sure nothing really changes.

The Democrats have tried. Sixteen years ago, they tried to do something about our health care system. But the Republicans came up with the Harry and Louise scare ads and we squandered that golden opportunity.

Well, the chances are good that Louise has Type 2 now, but can't afford test strips. Harry's probably working part time at Home Depot and has no health insurance. Neither has seen a doctor in two years because they can't afford to.

And how about you? Is your health care better now than it was in 1992? Could you have been worse off under "socialized medicine?" Health care in American now costs more than health care anywhere else in the world while the health of our population as a whole is far worse than that of people in other industrialized nations.

I'm ready for a change. I may not agree with all the policies the Democrats will put in place, but I know they are going to give it a hell of a try--which will be a lot easier to pull off if you also elect Democratic Senators and Representatives. And I know for a fact based on the last eight years that four more years of Republican rule is a huge "risk factor" for bad health consequences for all of us.