If We Had A Medical Section I'd Put This In It

[Thumpalumpacus]

Min, I thought someone as old and well-educated as yourself understood that all those huge words derived from Greek and Latin used by doctors cost real money. What, you think they grow on a word-tree? We Americans have the finest doctors inventing new syndromes that, of course, need polysyllabic names, and that shit ain't cheap. (Learnt that lesson about twenty years ago -- Raylene was having severe chest pains, went to the emergency room, waited five hours, got seen, x-rayed, and told she was suffering intercostal chondritis -- the cartilage in her ribs was irritated. "That'll be $5,361.29, please.")

I think it says a lot about the shitty state of health care in America when I say I'm happy I'm covered by the VA. They may pencil-whip appointment schedules, they may deny or delay (as they have in my case) non-critical care, but I don't pay a dime outside of occasional prescription copays, and I don't pay a penalty on 15 April. ACA is a failure not because universal care is wrong, but because it represents a legislated, and massive, transfer of wealth from individuals to corporations, with no guaranteed RoI, no guarantees about care, only a guarantee that the IRS won't try to fuck you too. Recovering libertarian though I am, I would have preferred single-payer. At least then, it's not the government acting as an enforcer for a private concern.