Thanks for thinking about us

Thanks for thinking about my wife and I. 

We are self-employed and certainly not poor. But for years we were among the 30M who couldn’t get health insurance that would cover pre-existing conditions due to the lack of reasonable options for small business owners. My wife wound up in a state insurance pool at a cost of about $13,000 per year and for three trips to the hospital over a two year period we ended up paying and additional ~$35,000 out-of-pocket. 

Something clearly needs to be done and it’s terminally naïve to think that the insurance industry is going to police itself. 

It’s equally naïve to assume that House Reps and Senators are going to do anything other than support the contributors who help them stay in office – for instance, health professionals and the insurance industry have already contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to Pete Sessions’ campaign committee for 2009-2010 and his next election isn’t until next November (http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00005681&cycle=2010). 

Unfortunately, no industry is supporting change, the majority who have health care don’t give a whit about the minority who don’t, naïve voters are easily manipulated by the self-serving hype financed by the health industry, and my wife and I don’t have the dollars to compete with the big money influencing the issue. 

We’re OK now – my wife took a job about four months ago with our county government so she and I are now among the haves.  

But I’m afraid it’s impossible for us to forget the 30M Americans who are still without adequate access to healthcare. 

Thanks for thinking about us.