Garland had every right to refuse. Gaetz has not been confirmed as the AG, therefore he has no right to demand anything. And then there's that pesky little fact that he is himself under investigation for very legitimate reasons. Typical right wing clown, barking at the moon.....
I remember my workplace health insurance premiums being higher because I am a woman. Women were charged higher premiums than men for same plan. No longer legal. Also, birth control wasn't covered. Insurance companies could refuse to cover pre-existing conditions. Others had waiting periods before pre- existing condition was covered. I worked at a company that decided to change health insurers so any care for existing conditions was stopped for a six month waiting period. One woman was pregnant and couldn't get prenatal care covered. Her husband was independent contractor so he had insurance through her. They made too much for Medicaid. She was stuck with the bill. The good old days
I'm fine paying a little more but it's not a little more ... I appreciate that it saves lives but it's a marginally better scenario than we had before. Insurance companies are still a giant scam for the most part even if they do some good. I get it, it's all about the small gains hopefully becoming the big gains but these companies are still raking in the money while denying a lot of people the procedures they need or fighting them over every little dollar. It's like Biden's plan to forgive student loans, it's a great thought and on the face people love it because 'YEA FREE MONEY' but it doesn't get to the root cause of the issue. Stop the wasteful spending and the game that these insurance companies and hospitals are playing while the American people are getting bent over by both.
Insurance companies both car and medical ARE scams, yes. But all we can do is chisel away at them in hopes they can be taken down and regulated with consumers in mind, not shareholders. So in that case, "marginally better" is better than what they were doing, and I hope down the line we continue to have "marginally better" than the previous iteration.
My neighbor is a Nurse of 15 years at hospital in Portland. She told me the other day it's crazy how many people hit the emergency room for simple non emergency stuff, which slows the unit down for those really dealing with an emergency. We have a culture of people that think they are sick one way or the other all the time and like to visit doctors or hospitals, when they could tough it out. Thats my take.....
A big factor you might want to consider before telling people they’re weak for going to the emergency room: the emergency room has to see you, even if you don’t have insurance (or have shitty insurance). I’m not going to judge people who don’t have the money or insurance to book an appointment with urgent care or zoom care or whatever. A philosophy of sucking it up and just dealing with it helped kill my dad at 64 so I do have a different angle on things.
There are a lot of people who go the emergency room for non emergencies, or things they should probably go to the doctors office for, but many people don't have insurance, and can't do that. The emergency room is easier and you don't have to pay up front and you either get instant confirmation you have something you should have come in for or you get instant relief that its not. Sometimes people have symptoms and they are scared it could be something bad and go in the off chance it is. Most of the times it's not, but other times like in your dad's case or my mom's it's the bad thing that will kill you. So, I don't blame people for going. There might be a lot of people that fill the ER, but there are ways of assessing who is in most need of help/worse off and helping them first. Also, we did just have a pandemic with a killer sickness. People are more worried now when they get sick.
Sorry about your father. I realize that people need to have emergency care available, I myself have used the ER. I was definitely to abrasive with my comment. My father had never been to or in a hospital till he was 72, ER that detected a tumor on his kidney.
Yeah, I don't like going to the hospital. I watched both my parents die in them and haven't been to an ER since. Though, I know there will come a day when I likely will need to go. I have been to the ER over a couple handful of times in my life. Mostly for broken bones, or bad injuries. I have gone there when my back locked up and I should have just stayed home for that one. But, sometimes you are like oh shit what do I do? I have gone for chest pains. That's a common reason, one of if not the most common. People afraid they are having heart attacks. Most of the time it's heartburn or something that's pretty harmless. For me, it turned out I had a hiatal hernia. I ended up getting surgery to fix it. The surgeon told me I did it just in time. Any longer and I would have developed throat cancer. Sometimes going is the right thing to do. Better safe than sorry.
I’ve used zoom doc appointments before as an alternative to ER and/or doc on call for chest cold’s etc.
I recently had a relatively simple out patient surgery but ended up having complications. I waited two full days before going to the ER because I didn't want to have to spend what would have likely been most of a day waiting (and puking) because of one of the very reasons cited; people using it as a walk in clinic. By the time I finally had no choice but to go, I was so bad they had no choice but to admit me almost immediately. I was stupid for waiting, but when people are using the ER when they don't really need it, it gums up the works in multiple ways for the people who are actually having an emergency.
This is what advice nurses are for. Especially nowadays with video conferencing, etc. This should be a service that every hospital and medical center provides and is reimbursed (at average nurses pay rate for the area) by the government.
I went to ER after I entered BART station face first. It was rainy, steps were slippery, I had picked a bunch of lemons from my tree to give away and was off balance. My foot slipped and I went flying. So focused on trying to get to work I picked myself up and sprinted up the stairs just as train shut the doors. Then realized I hurt a lot, went to restroom and saw I had two broken teeth and blood running down my face. Also broken wrist, fortunately left hand. Station agent asked if I wanted cab but I had no cash. Walked two miles to Eden hospital still toting bag of lemons. Then called work. Returned to work next day with face looking like I had done ten rounds with a Mixmaster and a kind coworker, hearing I was hurt, gave me a box of chocolate covered caramels. I couldn't chew. Meeting friend for lunch that weekend. We went to Cajun restaurant so I could have gumbo.
Advice nurses are a great resource and should be in use far more than they are. I agree every medical clinic/hospital should have one free of charge. It would curb ERs getting maxed out and help educate those who don't need to come in on how to treat themselves at home.
