There's not a whole ton to say about such stories of woe. I will note that they show how luck works in health care. The mother's stroke and the rare genetic blood disorders in two of the sons aren't conditions higher deductibles or more cost-sharing would help with. Such reforms would just bankrupt a working family already laboring beneath far too much. Meanwhile, you think these folks are ever going to get decent insurance outside of a massive corporation or government pool again? Yeah, me neither.
Elsewhere, my friend Murray Waas's rebuttal to Washington Ciity Paper's shameful attempts to turn his survival of cancer into some hack bit of pop-psychology is powerful and affecting. I'll note that cancer drove Murray, then a Pulitzer-prize finalist journalist, into bankruptcy. with all the stigma that carries. One of the City Paper reporters actually accused him of being "a deadbeat cancer survivor." And the award for Most Extraordinary Display of Prickishness in Pursuit of an Article goes to....
I've spoken to Murray more recently about insurance costs and they are, for him (and all others who've once been sick), not cheap. Is there anything humane about a health care system that strains to price out those who've been unlucky enough to avail themselves of its services? We have a massive, miraculous industry devoted to healing paired with a massive, malicious industry devoted to making such miracles unaffordable to those likeliest to need them.
