Poll of the Day > 1 in 7 Americans have medical debt in collections

(+) Yeah! (+)

Because health insurance refuses to pay for medical costs the way they should and they get away with because US lawmakers allow them to do so. CC debt should also be reigned in as well.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/20/upshot/medical-debt-americans-medicaid.html


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Yeah, our healthcare system stinks.

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wait, your insurance doesn't cover insurance?

Do you guys need insurance insurance?

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Yeah, it's pretty shitty. You can go to the hospital for something and when you're done they'll be like, "insurance may cover this but we'll see"

And some people aren't even aware they have debt because they thought insurance took care of it and end up with ruined credit rating.

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Our entire country is disintegrating because of the greed of the super rich

Nothing is gonna be better until we tear down the entire system and build a better one

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Me: "I've got insurance. It will cover most of this exam fee to find out what this lump on my arm is."

My insurance:

On a more selfish note. I really should be more mindful of my own health. Stories like this and many others may very well end up being my own story if I am not careful.

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Zangulus posted...

Wut? Where did you get that?

oh, sorry - I got that from how insurance rufising to pay medical costs in the OP when that's their sole job.

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Lokarin posted...

oh, sorry - I got that from how insurance rufising to pay medical costs in the OP when that's their sole job.

The only case that I can understand for insurance refusing to pay is if you have some kind of hypochondriac that feels like they're going to die every week unless they get something checked out needlessly.

But that's why it should just be covered by tax dollars and health insurance should be done away with entirely. Healthcare shouldn't be any different than firefighters or cops. Health and emergency services should be covered by tax dollars. It's pretty infuriating how much of my paycheck goes to the government every week yet I can't even just go to the doctor without worrying about opening up my wallet

My insurance has at various times:

Arbitrarily overruled my doctor and declared thousands of dollars of allergy tests as "unnecessary".

Claimed one of the doctors assigned to me by the in network hospital was "out of network" even after I pointed out he was listed by name on the insurance company's own web site as being in network.

Tried to deny payment for a specialist because my primary care physician didn't fill out the referral exactly the way the insurance company wanted it.

Taken an entire month to decide if I really needed surgery when I had a herniated disk in my neck which was pinching a nerve and rendering my right arm nearly useless.

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My insurance gave me an exception to go to an out of network rehab when I went to treatment and then denied every single claim due to "billing code errors" so now I have like a $16k outstanding bill out there lol

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OhhhJa posted...

But that's why it should just be covered by tax dollars and health insurance should be done away with entirely. Healthcare shouldn't be any different than firefighters or cops. Health and emergency services should be covered by tax dollars. It's pretty infuriating how much of my paycheck goes to the government every week yet I can't even just go to the doctor without worrying about opening up my wallet

Especially where the US government already pays more per capita for health care than any other country in the world. That's what really gets me. If it were a question of just shuffling people's current insurance payments into increased tax bills to cover the care, there'd be some room for argument (as outlined here, I'd say doing away with insurance companies' obfuscation and inconsistent coverage would justify such a change, even without getting into the humanitarian angle), but that's not even the case. The government has currently allocated enough tax dollars to provide health care to everyone (an assumption that's based on the fact that every other country in the world has managed that for less than half as much money) such that nobody would be paying anything extra for it at all.

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Jen0125 posted...

$16k outstanding bill

Is this the same insurance provider you work as an underwriter for?
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