Health insurance vs. assurance-gctid184018

[Nana]

This is a chapter from my book The Rule Book And Users Guide for Healthy Living. By Nana Kwaku Opare, MD, MPH, CA

Enjoy!

Available at opare.net

 Have You Got Your Health Assurance Card?

Health has no price. — Swahili

In the United States, health is often the hot topic in national discussion and debate. The majority of the discussion is around health insurance. Who has it? Who doesn't? Is it a right or is it a privilege? Who should pay for it? Much less discussion is around what does it pay for and what are you really insuring?

The fear of getting sick, suffering and perishing from some horrible illness is real and in-creasing. For good reason, rates of serious chronic illnesses like diabetes and cancer are rising rapidly. The prospect of having to pay for these illnesses is daunting. The fear of not being able to afford medical care when we do get sick is also rising. That fear is real. Medical care costs are spiraling out of control. In 2009, 17.4 percent of the U.S. GDP (gross domestic product) went to the medical industry. This portion has been steadily rising. The country with the next largest bite is The Netherlands 12.0 percent.(9) Hospitalization can cost more than $10,000 per day. Medications can cost hundreds and even thounited snakesnds of dollars per month. Physician bills, dental bills, medical equipment bills, rehabilitation and physical therapy bills, dialysis and so on are beyond the cost of the majority of the population. Only the wealthy can imagine ever paying these bills out of pocket. No surprise our preoccupation on health care insurance.

More and more people are going bankrupt as a result of medical bills. A 2007 Harvard study found sixty-two percent of bankruptcies are due to medical bills. This percentage has been climb-ing precipitously since 2001. This is sad enough in and of itself. Even sadder is that in three-quar-ters of these medical bankruptcies, the person had health insurance.(10) In other words, these folks thought they did everything right. They played by the rules. They held down that good job that gave them health insurance that would protect them and their family financially in case of illness — and they still went broke. This is a travesty and a betrayal of the system we have been sold to believe is the "best in the world."

There is little evidence to suggest that the U.S. system of medical care results in healthier people.(11) But what is clear is that it results in poorer people. You don't just have medical bills when you get sick — you eventually stop having income. For most of us, after a couple of weeks at best, it is no work no pay. Get sick — get broke!

Think about it. What is health insurance anyway? We are paying some company our money and are betting them that we are going to get sick and we hope we lose and then they get to keep our money. They are also betting us our money that we don't get sick and then they get to keep our money. Sounds like a losing proposition for everyone except the insurance companies. More and more doctors are quitting, getting out of the medical business. The No. 1 reason doctors cite when they quit is outside influence and bureaucracy(12) (read that as health insurance companies) are making it harder and harder for them to do their job and make a good living.

Aside from all this, the "health insurance" our job provides us does nothing to keep us healthy. The health insurance product benefits us only when we get sick. And who wants to get sick?

So do we actually want to be healthy? Not as evidenced by our behavior. The risk factors for most illnesses have been known for decades. Public health statistics have shown a rise in diseas-es that have a clear and preventable cause and a drop in diseases that are due to causes beyond our control. Yet the behaviors that lead to these illnesses persist and in fact are accelerating. It should come as no surprise that the population as a whole is ignorant of the causes of (the almost entirely preventable) major killers and disablers of citizens of the industrialized world and now increasingly the developing world. Follow the money. Who stands to profit if merely changing our behavior can keep us from getting sick?  You can bet it isn't Eli Lilly, McDonald's, Sutter Health or even Aetna.

We have become a country of reckless drivers when it comes to our health. No wonder our insurance premiums keep rising. What is worse is that we have been sold the idea that disease is something that just happens to us. Is it the luck of the draw, or is it a result of bad genes? Is it a result of poisons in the environment we have no control over? Or is it virulent insidious microbes poised to infect us? None of this is something we can effectively control. So why bother trying. Just keep on doing what you have been doing. There is no need to take care if taking care will make no difference.

We have been sold this idea that when we "crash" or break down our bodies, we can just go to the human body shop (hospital or clinic) and see our human body mechanic (doctor or other health practitioner) and after pulling out our insurance card, they will fix us back as good as new or at least get us back on the road again. We don't have to pull cash out of our pockets. We are com-forted in the knowledge that because we have insurance we can go along our merry way smoking, drinking, and eating "food-like substances" and get away scot-free.

Remember the age-old adage — an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The funny thing is that most of us have forgotten this. The even funnier thing is that most of us believe that no matter what we do as we age, we will become sick and debilitated. We don't believe that we can feel great and be vibrant and productive well into our later years. And why should we believe otherwise? We see very few examples of those who do. We dismiss them as freaks of nature and fall back into our life-destroying habits.

We are confused by the smorgasbord of health misinformation out there — almost all of which is paid for by those who seek to capitalize on our illness or at least our fear of it. It is very profitable and good for business if people do not think they can do anything to keep themselves well. Or that only those who are weird zealots and extremists could possibly do that which would keep themselves well. So we go along our merry way committing slow suicide and dooming a large portion of ourselves and our heirs to insolvency. All the while we believe we are living the Amer-ican dream when we are (if we take a sober look at it) slowly dying the American nightmare of disease, disability, suffering, insolvency and death itself.

Affirmation: I will bet my money and my life on my good health, and hope I win. I invest in those things that have been proven to promote health and expect to reap dividends as I age. I choose to believe that I can feel good and be healthy if I take proper care of myself. I choose to believe that debilitation and illnesses are not the inevitable result of aging. I choose to believe that my health, like a good car, if I assiduously maintain it, will run great and look great as long as I choose to own it or live. I choose not to spend my money on the expense of health insurance. I chose to invest my money in health assurance. I choose to do that which will keep my body vehicle running well and my money in my bank account, not in some mega insurance company. I choose to make my decisions on how I live my life on what is prudent, wise and safe for my health, and not on what is decadent, capricious and reckless. I choose to eat wisely, exercise wisely and not poison myself with drugs, tobacco, alcohol or coffee. I enjoy feeling good and vital and not having to depend on pills or the hope that when I inevitably get sick, I don't go broke. I choose, when I die, to leave my money to my heirs and not the hospital and drug industry. I choose to spend my money on good, clean, organic food; yoga and tai chi classes, and therapy and spiritual work that will pay me lifelong dividends in feeling better while I am alive. I bet my money on staying healthy and I am confident I will win!

All rights reserved copyright 2011 by Nana Kwaku Opare, MD, MPH, CA

[Nana]

Keep posted more to come!