Universal healthcare legislation such as HR 676 and California’s SB 562 offers so many great results. No premiums, co-payments or fees; essentially all medical conditions covered, and an underlying principle that every resident is entitled to health care.
But it’s even better than that!
One result of universal healthcare is a well-kept secret: it’s not in the language of either bill, not even tucked away in fine print; it’s rarely if ever discussed by pundits; and it’s hardly mentioned by the promoters of single-payer, Medicare for All, and/or other universal healthcare schemes.
What aren’t they trumpeting?
THERE WOULD BE NO MORE MEDICAL DEBT.
…when a medical procedure costs more than your house is worth, the idea of being able to pay it back is laughable. And by laughable, I mean it will crush your spirit.
NO BANKRUPTCIES DUE TO THE COSTS OF TREATMENT.
NO BILLS TO PAY, SO NO MORE MEDICAL DEBT COLLECTION AGENCIES.
NO MORE PARENTS COPING WITH TRAGEDY AND AT THE SAME TIME BECOMING IMPOVERISHED BECAUSE THEY WEREN’T ABLE TO AFFORD THE LITERALLY MILLIONS OF DOLLARS OUR SYSTEM CHARGES FOR A BIRTH CONDITION.
What about...
Anxiety about a future potentially financially ruinous medical event? Collection agencies taking over and harassing sick and grieving people because hospitals and other medical service providers have sold debts to the piranhas? People putting up GOFUNDME’s for their friends’ medical expenses, as Carlos Espinoza just did for Micah Fletcher, the man who was stabbed but not killed by the white supremacist in Portland, Oregon?Our friend was stabbed and critically injured while being a good Samaritan and heroically intervening during the racist terrorist incident that left 2 men dead. He bravely did what anyone should do when confronted with terrorism and stepped in to stop the harassment of Muslim women by a known White Supremacist. I am starting this GoFundMe to cover his hospital and recovery expenses. Please help as much as you can.
Gone. Gone. Gone..
Medical debt is the most pernicious debt of all. You can make a not-very-compassionate case that if you sign mortgage papers or take out education loan, you are making a choice. A choice fraught with pressure and often unfairly structured to cheat you at the benefit of the super-rich, but a choice. However, no one but a Republican could look you in the eye and tell you that taking yourself or someone you love to the hospital TO SAVE A LIFE is a choice.
What about the poor debt collectors? Will we have to shed tears (or pay unemployment benefits) when they lose their jobs? Not a chance. First, they won’t have to worry about not being able to pay for healthcare while unemployed! And they can likely get work in the booming business of student debt collection. (Shhh… Don’t tell them we’re gunning to get rid of student debt next…)
This nice person wouldn’t be able to earn money posing in ads like this anymore...If the only thing a universal health care system did was abolish medical debt from the equation of our lives it would be worth it, even at the extraordinary costs of American health care today. But in the long run universal care costs less and is better for society than what we have now, or (shudder) what the Republicans want us to have. That’s true WITHOUT even paying attention to the elimination of medical debt as a net positive for society. Add that in and you have...
Win, win, win, win, win. Only Paul Ryan and his sick dreams lose.
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Co-authored by Kossack kith, a member along with jpmassar of Strike Debt Bay Area, fighting against unjust debt and its societal implications. In 2012 Strike Debt created the Rolling Jubilee, which abolished $32M in medical debt by leveraging $700K to purchase debt given to collection agencies on the financial markets and, in essence, burning it.
Strike Debt Bay Area is a Community coalition partner in the fight for SB 562, Universal Health Care for California.