This story parallels a similar struggle I face. To keep a long story short; Due to ongoing abuse as a young child, I struggle to manage symptoms of complex PTSD. My husband and I work hard every day to care for our family but have mostly lived near the poverty line with no health coverage. Getting help for my mental wellness is not affordable. Sometimes the flashbacks, nightmares & panic attacks are to much for me to bear without help. Despite my resilience, sometimes I get suicidal. During one such episode my daughter called 911 for help. As a result, the police showed up, threw me to the ground like a criminal, handcuffed me and took me to our local hospital against my will, no questions asked. This is the protocol for those struggling with mental injuries. At the hospital, everything that I use to cope was taken from me. I was forced to take drugs that I had an allergic reaction to and generally received no help for my suicidal ideation or my battle with PTSD. I almost lost my job while I was there. Thankfully I know how to play the "Don't speak the truth, just tell them what they want to hear game". After I got out, I vowed to never ask for help again. Guess who got a bill for $3,500!!! I have been paying what I can towards this bill most every month. This month, due to Coronavirus financial concerns I did not pay. Guess who now has a summons to appear in court due to said bill, Me. This is the American health system at work.
2
And so Trump wants to Lower your employment taxes, ie. what you and your employer are putting into social security and medicare.......so, lower social security for one and all. He said he'd do it...this is his first foray. In addition, cut back on medicare. Spoke with a Doctor I know the other day and learned that nobody can get tests yet (hey Pence) and, if they could they don't know who will be able to pay for them.
It's a public health issue! What do they think taxes are for?
3
I was discussing this with my sister and she is of the opinion if there is a widespread epidemic in the United States the entire U.S. Medical System will be forced to change.
If everyone cannot afford to have treatment for a disease then you are basically saying as a society you DON'T CARE if they spread the disease or die, they can get treatment when they can afford it and NOT before.
A society can only take so much of this barbarism before they revolt.
5
The profit motive should be removed from health providers. I remember a time when they were non profit and affordable.
4
If you get sick, and if you get treatment, who pays for that? Well, if you have insurance, your insurer will pay up the tab after you front the copay. If you don't have insurance, then you pay out-of-pocket.
So, why is there any difference for covid-19? Why is it even a question? For these father-and-daughter, since the mother is already coming down with symptom, and the immediate family (her father) had already died due to covid-19, it's almost certain that this whole family is infected (or at least need some form of treatment). For public safety, they would also need to be quarantined to ensure they don't pass on the infection to more people. Why would it even be a question that the government should pick up the tab, just because this is covid-19?
3
@tiddle exactly, covid-19 is not any difference from common flu or any other diseases in that sense. A lot of people will never seek for treatment immediately...Clearly because a. They don’t have insurance, the bills are too high b. Even if they do have insurance, the left over bills are still too high...that’s why the gov needs to fix it and makes medical bills affordable other wise this thing is spreading like crazy
3
@tiddle because they did not ask to be quarantined. if they went to the hospital with seeking medical treatment without insurance, sure they should pay out of pocket (tho I still agree healthcare should be affordable) but in this case, it was mandatory quarantine and then they were forced to pay a bill. that makes absolutely no sense. imagine you have a fever, its mild, you don't need medical attention yet but someone forces you to stay in a hospital and then you have to pay the bills?
3
@Jrok, Agree. The healthcare system in US is arcaic, with multiple industries (insurance, hospitals, medical providers, billing providers, and more) all milking us. It definitely needs fixing. I don't think there's any dispute on this. But is it the "how" that's in question in this 2020 primaries season.
Do we opt for Sanders, sink the Titanic, throw everyone in the water, while going to the shipyard to build another gigantic ship to come to the rescue? Or, do we throw lifeboats in the water and let people survive first, while waiting for rescue team (or another ship) to come, as the variations of ACA is propositioned, all while arguing whether we have enough money to mount a rescue or build another ship? I don't know about you, but I would take the latter option any day.
1
I think this epidemic is a good reason to join all other civilized nations and implement healthcare for all.
19
I think he should pay the bill and count his blessings. $4K is a drop in the bucket compared to some hospital bills I have received. And for seven days? Either they left something out, or Mr. Wucinski is fortunate to get off so light.
I also believe that expatriates that flee to the U.S. should have to pay for the flight and the quarantine. It is a voluntary evacuation. If I was able to save my daughter and, as a result, myself, I would welcome the debt.
I pray for their safety and I'm sorry for their loss and that Anna will not see her grandma again.
BTW, that quarantine site. MCAS Miramar is just over the hill from where I live. So the coronavirus is only eight miles from my house. I feel a bit vulnerable as I know many people who work there.
3
@Joe Weil You're lucky that you are in a position where 4 grand is a drop in the bucket for you. I'm not sure most Americans are that fortunate.
23
@Joe Weil Many Americans living from paycheck to paycheck would be unable to pay a $4000 bill. Great that you're in a financial situation where you think he could just "pay the bill and count his blessings". It sounds as if you think healthcare should be a merit based system?
15
Little girl is separated from her mother!! So so sad!!!
2
As long as health care is not a right;then we need to be ready for a thousand typhoid Marys continuing to work and spread the disease because they cannot afford to get medical help. One person makes choices that only concern them,but that is not the case with this brewing epidemic.
25
He most certainly had a choice in the matter, when he accepted the government's offer to evacuate him out of China. His assumption that it would be covered should have been a factor in deciding whether or not to accept the government's offer. I understand that he was doing what he thought was best for the health and safety of his daughter, but working and living overseas was a choice again that he made.
4
@Jeremy Shocking lack of compassion for a fellow US citizen. I know we are not all military but surely 'no man left behind' should apply to our citizens during a global pandemic. If we are all just out for ourselves we will surely suffer more than if we all come together (figuratively not literally!). From now on you can bet we'll all be asking who's paying as they forcibly quarantine us!!
31
@Hello I would be shocked to learn that he took this job opportunity in China because it was for the global good. I am almost sure it was an economic choice that he made. He took on a certain level of risk in the name of economic gain, which if course his right. If we as a country were to extend the complete protections of the United States to all citizens abroad, then I would be first in line to sign up to work in some remote stretch somewhere but then I would fully expect the US government to move heaven and earth to come rescue me at the first sign of trouble. It is unfortunate, please do not misunderstand me, that this situation occurred and I do not wish harm to befall anyone, but I am quite sure he was compensated for taking the risks that he did. No one is saying that this little girl should suffer, but at some point the father must realize that there are those of us who choose to raise our families within the confines of the US (although we might not get paid the premium wages) for this very reason. Expecting the rest of us to swoop in and save the day at the expense of John Q. Public does a disservice to us who have made the choice not to work outside the country and make due with the economic consequences of that choice.
1
@Jeremy this is the kind of bulloney minutia that stops us from having smart conversations about collectively fixing our systems and caring for each other! Very judgy when you know so little about these people - I hope I never need you to decide if I "deserve" care or assistance!
3
...and people still think that Bernie's proposal of Medicare for all is extreme!
26
Pretty hard to "contain" an epidemic when you threaten to bankrupt anyone who admits being exposed.
53
When listening to all the warnings about hand-washing, I started wondering how many germs lurk under ladies' long manicured nails, where washing may not easily reach.
6
@Linda S. And this relates to the article...how?
3
@Linda S., I've been cutting down even my Starbucks visits in the past month or so since this is totally discretionary. Same is true with nail saloon.
1
@Linda S. How can people who paint their nails tell if the is dirt under their fingernails? I can understand putting a clear coat on to prevent split nails but why use opaque paint? You bring up a good point.
My ambulance cost here in New Zealand is a US$56 donation compared to US$2,598 being charged in the US. The hospital visit and stay is $0. So how is that 'health care for profit' working out compared to our 'socialist universal health care'. The spread of the disease will likely show the results of the ugly underbelly of the US health care system.
Companies hiding behind "due to patient privacy concerns" is more admission of ethical violations of the company than the protection of the victim (I mean patient).
43
@James Wallis Martin
To answer your question: it's working out great! For insurance companies and the for profit health system.
Not so much for the rest of us.
I remember the 90's when the last 'big push' for nationalized healthcare happened (and worked with a small group advocating for it); the insurance companies squashed it like a bug, scaring everyone with awful stories about "socialized medicine". That's one way they like to use their profits: convincing those they are taking advantage of that they're the only reasonable game in town, when it's simply self-serving greed at work.
So enjoy your sane healthcare. It is a right, not a privilege.
33
Since the care was coordinated through the government, charges should fall under the National Disaster Medical System umbrella. When they were processed into quarantine (presumably through a Federal Coordinating Center), they should have received an NDMS tag and then can submit the claims for NDMS payment. Way easier said than done, but yes the payment is supposed to be covered by the government and not the patient.
16
@Elizabeth, It's a "government offer," these are not military or diplomatic personnels. Why would it be free? Being an expat is a lifestyle choice, I don't taxpayer's dollars to pay for someone's lifestyle expenses.
2
In many, you may call, "socialist" countries in Western and Central Europe, the government would not only cover the medical costs but also pick up the pay for the time the patient had to spend away from work either in a hospital or isolation for coronavirus.
16
If 80 percent have relatively mild symptoms, there is no effective treatment and approximately 30 percent are uninsured you can cough up any worries about containment. Don the masks and doctors be dam. Thoughts and prayers suckers.
6
They should contact the ACLU about being HELD AGAINST THEIR WILL - AND being BILLED for it! That is like having to pay your own ransom! Being under duress should invalidate anything they signed.
9
@David Starkey, Or, US government won't extend the offer to airlift them out, and they can stay in Wuhan (where they have lived for years). That's totally their free choice.
3
People need to think. Then vote for Bernie. We must have gov’t single-payer health care, like every other industrialized nation. Is that really such a radical idea?
17
@Anonymous
No, it is not a radical idea. What the GOP is doing now to everything from climate change to voter suppression, immigration and health care is radical. Why people can't or won't acknowledge this is beyond me.
17
If Frank Wucinski values his and his daughter's health, he would return to China where the government is covering all costs related to COVID-19 and the "Healthy China 2020" program provides health insurance to all employees. It is profoundly sad, but the wealthiest country in the world is too cruel to provide health care as a human right and too dumb to provide preventive care for contagious diseases at no cost. COVID-19 will kill millions if we charge $4,000 a pop for people to get tested and receive basic treatment.
29
@UC Graduate, Comments like yours is so naive. Have you ever been to China or lived under its systems (including healthcare)? Do you seriously believe that China is covering all its citizens' needs, as Sanders might have you think Cuba did?
If you've never lived in an authoritarian country before, I really suggest you give it a go. Spend a year or so back in China. Better yet, go there while you're sick, and see how well (not) you'll be taken care of.
1
@tiddle
As far as the Chinese go and their totalitarian government that’s a false equivalency. Nobody is saying that we want to have totalitarianism. What we are saying is that, at the very least, the Chinese government cares for its people far better than the United States is in the area of healthcare.
And given you don’t want your taxes being spent on “lifestyle choices”, surely you object to Trump’s jaunts to Mar a Lago , where taxpayers cover many of his expenses. He has a perfectly acceptable house in Washington DC where his work is. You must object to that as well.
3
@Chana, Beware of what you wish for, particularly when it comes to China. My guess is, you never lived under the rule of the Chinese government before, and you have no idea what you're compromising by having the government "takes care of everything" for you, if that's what you're implying that it's a good thing.
If you want a better system, look to Europe, NOT China nor any authoritarian regimes like Cuba. I can decidedly assure you, you do NOT want to give up all your personal freedom, just so that you can have some medical coverage.
And by the way, the medical system in China is not like NIH (UK) or Medicare (Australia). If you want proper treatment, you would still need to cough up the dough, UPFRONT, before they would admit you. Please, before you start advocating for China, go live there for a while and see for yourself.
1
Wait...what?!? The government basically holds you hostage and you have to pay for it?!?
Well if fairly healthy people who suspect they have the virus quit showing up to hospitals to get tested, now we know why. And I don't blame them.
After reading this, that's my plan.
24
By the way: this is the same guy that coughed all over his daughter during a fox Interview.
He did everything wrong. Coughed in the air, coughed on the kid, shared a bottle of water with her ... During an interview about the coronovirus!
8
@Armin I think he had already been tested and proven to not have the virus.
1
Maybe Fox News can cover the bills of the father in the photo that appeared on their cameras live and put America in danger with his ignorant and thoughtless observations.
Thoughts and prayers.
2
It’s free in authoritarian China. Lol
15
And this is how this outbreak is likely going to be way worse than necessary in the US - people will avoid seeking help because they are afraid of the bills.
36
@NH, It depends on whether people are worried more about medical bills, or whether they'll just die from it.
1
If one is required to go to a hospital by an outside force, in this case, the American government, then surely the government should be billed, especially when the child was not ill. I hope Mrs. Wucinski recovers and the family is reunited soon.
18
THIS is why Bernie
21
Will this be the issue that finally breaks the ridiculous system we have?
21
Medicare for all. Vote for a progressive candidate like Bernie, not a regressive one like Biden. Dump Trump 2020.
17
Like so many others who have tangled with the healthcare industrial complex before him, Mr. Wucinski needs a good bankruptcy lawyer.
8
Good post.
I’m a 2 timer.(now on MediCaid)
Whenever I get some billing clown on the phone claiming I have to pay my share of cost I just laugh and give them my lawyer’s name.
No more bill collector.
1
I believe this is or should be an example of a government taking They are effectively asserting eminent domain over a person's freedom and body. Such assertion means they should pay rightful compensation.
3
People don't have insurance = vulnerable to illness and possible vector for infectious disease. Too expensive to go to the doctor. Yet our local BCBS just made $12 million this year, down from $17 million last year. What in the world qualified him to get this money - he was a former lobbyist, not a doctor, not a researcher, not a nurse. And we wonder why our bills are so high.
20
I'm no lawyer but the counterpart to caveat emptor is caveat venditor. this sounds like a privity/contract issue. Mr. Wucinski was not a party to this deal. i don't see why you should be on the hook.
8
Hospitals turn the charges over to bill collectors, wash their hands - so to speak- of CV-related admissions, and let former patients deal with it all themselves. Then those same patients have to try to negotiate their way through a byzantine health-care bureaucracy for some sort of succor. Which means a large cohort of potentially CV-infected people will avoid reporting to hospitals if they aren’t on any health plans, guaranteeing the spread of the virus...this is America, after all.
23
the American health system is a constant tale of horrors to us Europeans.
42
@suédoise And to us Americans as well.
41
@suédoise And also to us Canadians!
9
@suédoise, And your economy is doing so well that it's the envy of the world.
1
I think this microscopic virus is going to expose all that has been wrong with the systems of the world. Everything that is corrupt, unfair, and rotten is going to splinter and crash.
36
$2,598 for an ambulance ride?? How is that even possible.
39
@RA
"List" prices as opposed to actual prices negotiated with insurance companies. Look at any Medicare bill, for example. My OT charges well over $100 a visit but is paid maybe $60. As she often works with more than one patient at a time, I think that's reasonable. Apparently it is also "customary." Reasonable and customary are the standards for Medicare, but not for private uninsured patients.
4
@RA
Obscene profits! Private healthcare. Greed. But mostly ignorance on the part of the 99% of Americans that cannot comprehend social medicine working in America.
14
@Barbara
You mean you have to pay even more money if you are too poor to afford insurance???
6
Large deductibles
Plans loaded with "wellness" benefits
Income based premiums
When designing the ACA, did anyone think about the problem of illness or worse yet, contagious illness?
8
@Kathy Anderson
All Obamacare was designed to do was to make sure big medicine got the bulk of their excess charges.
4
The ACA (“Obamacare”) is not perfect, but it has allowed millions of Americans better, often more affordable, access to credible and effective healthcare, both preventative and for acute and chronic conditions. This then helps maintain and grow our GDP by keeping people at work or getting them back to work sooner; protects public health by getting folks in for professional assessment and appropriate treatment sooner and with follow-up.
It does have gaps and, since it is actually not about healthcare itself, but about health insurance, it’s more of a boon to insurance companies and their investors.
12
@Her You could have skipped to your last sentence-its a boon to insurance company and their investors. That is what we need to gut and exterminate!
9
I find it interesting that the US, with 10x the population of Canada, only has 40 more cases than us. Could it be that sick people aren't seeking medical attention because they can't afford it? I suspect that your case numbers are going to skyrocket, assuming you can figure out who has it. It is also interesting that in the US there has been person to person spread whereas in Canada every person diagnosed so far has picked it up on their travels. You guys should be very worried. I think you are just seeing the beginning of this.
53
@Jane McCall
There have been two cases of person to person transmission. The US stopped travel in from China much faster than Canada did, which has a much higher rate of travel from China than the US.
5
@Jane McCall
Canada has discovered more cases than the US because it's testing more people. In the US, trump's guy at the CDC sent out test kits that didn't work, and sharply limited who could be tested.
The trump administration obviously concluded that the best way to keep the number of confirmed coronavirus cases low is to not test for it.
31
Should have seen that one coming. In the US, every patient is a profit center. My daughter, visiting LA on business, got the flu on a weekend and had to go to the ER. 15 minutes later, she was released with meds and her wallet was $600 lighter. Glad her (foreign) company pays for travel insurance...
28
@expat I can't even afford to get sick out of state on my BCBS insurance...
7
@expat Wait until all the extra surprise bills come in. I thought I got out of the ER with my wallet $450 lighter, but when all the extra surprise bills were finally done trickling in months later, it was actually $1,000 lighter.
18
@expat An Urgent Care center would have been less expensive.
If you collapse on the street and wake up in the hospital, you're responsible for the bills. You don't have to sign anything or have any kind of clue and circumstances don't mean anything as far as I can tell. He was foolish to come to the US without health insurance, especially since children don't seem to be at much risk. It's cheaper in other countries but it works the same, if you're not vested in that country's health system then you're responsible for the bills and you'll need insurance that works in that country or lots of cash. I guess he though he could escape the epidemic, but that isn't possible.
9
@roseberry "come to the US?" He is American. Where els is he supposed to go? Because of our crazy system, some people cannot afford health insurance. But if the government requires care by law, they should absolutely be ready to pay for it. Children must be vaccinated to attend school, but vaccines are free in every state. What happened here is just wrong.
60
@roseberry it’s criminal nothing was said regarding payment of services at the time he was transferred back to the US. When this really gets rolling in the next few weeks, there will be innumerable citizens stuck with bills they can’t pay for, compliments of our terrible and inhumane healthcare system. If anything good could come out of this pending tragedy, it’s that enough Americans will finally see there’s a vastly better system available. It’s called Single Payer, and it’s what every other developed nation offers its citizens.
38
@Susan The US doesn't have universal health insurance, even though you and I agree that it should. Thinking something should be doesn't make it so. The man has insurance in China, but not here, and he could hardly be unaware that he has no insurance here. I'm not saying he doesn't have a right to come here but we all have to pay our hospital bills here. Lots of US citizens have health insurance in foreign countries (because that's where they live) and not in the US (because they don't live here and health insurance is expensive) and I would advise all those people to stay in the country where they have insurance when they get sick because if they come home, they could be in for some big bills.
10
The Takings Clause of the fifth amendment requires just compensation when the government takes something from an individual for the public’s interest. Frank Wuchinski and Annabel’s freedom were taken, albeit temporarily. I’d argue all the expenses and costs associated with the taking should be paid.
20
@Baltimore Ravings
No one required that he and his daughter return to the US, that was a choice he made for himself and his daughter. He agreed to remain in quarantine as a condition of that free transportation and free room and board for two weeks. He received bills from the hospital and ambulance service, and we don't have any idea whether he will wind up paying them.
He and his daughter could have remained in China and would now be caring for his sick wife after attending the funeral of his father-in-law/child's grandfather.
In China, the daughter is responsible for caring for her parents in retirement, including his healthcare.
This is a non-newsworthy article, since few facts are actually available.
We do know that excellent Chinese healthcare resulted in the death of the father-in-law and the wife left behind is sick.
2
He'd better stay in China, where the government would cover all examination and treatment fees. All covid-19 patients are examined and treated for free in China.
18
@Sean T
If that is true, than the Wuhan coronavirus is the only disease which is being treated for free in China. Under normal circumstances, individuals have to pay for their medical treatment in China. The costs are low, because the medical workers are not paid much. It's similar to Cuba, in that you have to provide your own medications and bring a family member to change your bedding and do your laundry. Workers paradise.
1
@ebmem I would rather the China worker system than U S put you in debt,bankruptsy and homelessness. 65,000 people in US were forced into bankruptcy last year by Medical community, the modern day Pirates!
4
@ebmem
No. Basic health care is free In China.
There is an effort to realize universal health care in China by 2020 and they have covered up to 90% of the country by now.
It's still a mix between public and private insurance but on the whole, people are covered - 1.5 billion people ...
1
Financial and political ramifications may be pandemic.
Individuals won’t be able to pay their medical bills.
Bankruptcies will go up markedly. Trump has used Bankruptcy successfully many times.
People won’t be able to work if there is an imposed universal quarantine.
Hospitals and insurance companies will be hard hit financially.
Expect healthcare coverage rates to rise exponentially.
Despite Trump’s declaration otherwise, the US is a demand driven economy; not a trickledown economy.
If working families are strapped, demand goes down depressing GDP growth.
Anticipate an extended decline in financial markets.
Trump has taken credit for a booming economy he inherited.
Hard for Trump to disavow a struggling economy, possibly a recession or worse.
As so many have pointed out, broad acceptance of single payer. health insurance will take hold.
Intertribal conflict takes a backseat when survival is first order of business.
If my ravings are even close, it’s hard to imagine Trump being re-elected.
That’s the only silver lining I see.
We are a strong nation. We will survive this.
38
@ebmem Right. So very true. Because all Democrats have no 401Ks in the stock market, are all extremely healthy and have no underlying health issues, and all are young. The exact reasons we are all hoping for Armageddon, even though none of us believe in Armageddon. I am so glad we have you to tell us what we believe and hope for. Thanks so much.
12
@ebmem
It remains to be seen if the US under Trump's leadership is prepared. The fallout could point out the deficiencies in not addressing various problems, like our health care system. As it is we know how expensive care at a hospital can be. My insurance agent told me to take a taxi to the hospital because ambulances were too expensive & not always covered. This is for a gold ppo plan costing $1300/mo. with $3500 deductible per person. I have to say I will be self treating at home until last minute if I develop symptoms, too expensive in US to get treatment.
9
@lulu In one day with H1N1 (even though I had a flu shot), I lost considerable fluids. My family took me to an ED, where I was tested and given fluids. If you wait "until last minute (sic)" to deal with serious symptoms, it may be too late.
Frank voluntarily accepted the government’s offer to be evacuated. To me, it is very logical that he should pay for his own medical bills. He could have easily stayed in China and helped his sick wife and her family...and not risked infecting the California population.
12
@Emily Margaret
That is just cruel... He came to care for his daughter....
42
@Emily Margaret You sounds nice!
17
@Emily Margaret I have bad news Emily- California’s population already is infected, and I predict there will be a steep rise in the numbers over the next few weeks. Is it “logical” that we haven’t changed from a healthcare system that costs 3 times what it needs to, and covers far fewer citizens than it could?
25
Hey you want the government to pay for the virus out break. Do not build the wall. There is four or five billion dollars better spent $$$$$!
41
Who will get tested when it’s not free? This is a big mistake-US government should take on the cost of this health crisis
40
Nick Kristoff just wrote about someone who was bill $3270 just to be tested. And that person didn't even require treatment after testing negative. For those who test positive, the costs will quickly escalate. Combine the fear of the uninsured and the underinsured about costs with the fear that a part of the population will have about being deported, and you could have a very preventable thing getting quickly out of control because people are too afraid to seek treatment or testing.
45
China came straight out and said they would cover the costs for those with virus so that it could get best cooperation from citizens.
19
@Keir Yeah, but they are communists /s
6
@Samiam What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?!!....
2
@ms Samian was being ironic
6
If this progresses to a full epidemic in the US it really should force the issue of just how unsustainable our entire medical system is. How this happens I don't know, only that it's all bound to end in tears.
32
The government has to pick up the tab, for medical care, missed work days, and alternate housing for those in shared households. There is no other way to make quarantine work.
Imagine a possibly infected food service or janitorial worker who doesn't know if they have a common cold or COVID-19. They have no health coverage, no sick leave days, and they live in a 2-bedroom apartment with 3 other people who depend on their paycheck to avoid being evicted.
Now imagine what it would take to put this person in an effective quarantine. And imagine the massive rethinking of government policy that would have to take place, and the speed at which it must happen.
Now imagine Pence in charge, with the buck stopping at Trump.
62
@mlbex
While I agree that the government has to pick up the tab at least for the testing and the medical stays (including quarantine), I am curious where the money will come from after trump's corporate tax cuts in 2017 drove up the federal deficit to record levels.
I am also curious about how food and essentials (such as medicines, toilet paper, household cleaning supplies, etc.) get delivered to those quarantined and how those costs are covered if there is a pandemic and some quarantined people are too poor to cover all the costs.
17
@Grainy Blue : The more we unpack this problem, the more complicated it gets. That's why it has to happen quickly, before too many people get infected and overwhelm the available resources.
18
@mlbex I can't do that. My window is too high and if I jump out I might get hurt.
1
While countries that provide Government-funded medical care wrestle with the spreading epidemic, Americans without superb health insurance will be hiding out or going broke, a simple reality this article exposes.
Why are so many Americans fearful of “socialized medicine”, even as we become more aware that all other modern nations provide government-provided medical care at far less cost? Why do so many here Insist, in effect, that only the wealthy and the luckiest deserve medical care - even for expensive illnesses like diabetes, many kinds of cancer, etc.?
Why do many Americans insist that government is our enemy - and do what they can to make it so?
Some of us are so old that we remember Americans were so proud of our government - our voice, our power as citizens! We watched as other nations admired our democratic system and strove for more people power in their own systems. Medical care for all at far less cost is one result, in most of Western Europe and Canada.
Perhaps this growing threat will lock us further into the current mode of saving good medical care for the wealthy (because it may get lucratively - and/or dangerously - expensive. Or perhaps it will wake us to the reality that we’d all be better off with access to health care.
54
It is late in the day and there are many divergent opinions, but as I read it there is more satisfaction with fully insured care systems. The problem is cost and how cost is shared or rationed. Americans bye in large favour private and the costs are proportionately much higher favouring the rich at the expense of easy access by the poor. All well and good until faced with a public health care emergency such as the one being confronted now. This virus is truly an equal opportunity disorder thus breaking the system. No plan exists apparently to protect all, and the resources for such emergencies are not clearly available, i.e. total incoherence. There does not appear to be a systematic national approach, thus disaster is almost certain. The virus is equal opportunity, care is not. It seems strange to me having worked as a surgeon on three continents during 50 years of experience that the USA is the least capable of an equal, efficient and effective response to public emergency.
28
@Tom Horan No profit in Equal,efficent or effective,Profit before people is the american way.
1
If the US want to contain or at least slow down the virus a bit, all treatments related to Corona should be free. Otherwise a lot of ill people won't go to the doctor or the hospital.
There also must be a quick easy way, to financially support those workers without paid sick leave and those, who have no work at all.
Otherwise all these people will spread the virus further.
This time, the population needs a bail out, so let the Fat Cats bleed money for this. It's in there own health interest.
39
@Morons Morons! When the government compels young men to serve in the military, it provides everything for their needs. When it compels suspects to be jailed prior to trial, the same is true. So for those subjected to quarantine and medical treatment, it should certainly be the responsibility of the government.
32
@Lawyermom AMEN! and lawyerly To!
This epidemic just may be the thing that fixes healthcare by first wrecking it.
Perhaps it will deliver us from Trump, too.
43
@Kathryn Aguilar: He might even catch it.
22
@mlbex
From your mouth to G1ds ears Amen
8
@mlbex
Just like his Grandfather caught the Spanish Flu?
2
Even with the best precautions, catching an infection like the coronavirus is a bit of a lottery. However, whether you will get stung with a big medical bill shouldn't be. America, it's time to support moves towards free, universal health care paid for by taxes, not unreliable, costly, complex private medical insurance plans.
29
@Lisa
70% chance of winning, 20% chance of a higher win and 2% will get the Jackpot.
This lottery is rigged.
@Lisa But New Zealand has a pubic-private system. Seems that it works there.
Just another issue for our designated genius, Pence. While we are at it, how about govt reimbursement for people whose workplaces are closed, meaning no money for them? Even if you have insurance, I suspect the companies will try to shift the burden to the govt...
8
Close to the best example of how the healthcare insurance system in the U.S. is a complete failure. The question of who pays for medicare care should not the overriding concern for receiving medical attention under compulsory orders from the government.
18
Way back on the campaign trail, Trump said, “You’re going to have much better health care at much lower cost.” Once he even said, “....at a fraction of the cost.” (I became angry when I heard that lie.) I have excellent health insurance, including now in retirement, because I was part of a huge unionized risk pool. How do uninsured folks, or those working for small business with lousy benefits, survive? My wife’s poor cousin gets state insurance for poor people, but she has to wait forever for treatment for serious things. No wonder the working poor are attracted to Bernie’s pronouncements, and not just for healthcare. Alas, if it were only that simple, and presumably well run. The “healthcare industrial complex” wants no part of it.
17
The problem is not want Medicare for All would cost, the problem is what it’s costing us without it. People without healthcare who don’t go to hospitals or doctors but go to work or school will infect otherwise healthy people. What we have now is putting the country at a greater risk while making insurance companies, doctors and hospitals rich.
30
@Sheela Todd I wonder how working people who live paycheck to paycheck without $400 put by for emergency are going to avoid a disaster? We are entering a national disaster!
2
Where is the VP when it counts. These are the things we need to here about before they become a problem. To believe that DJT thought that this is a hoax, or that $2.5B would handle the economic cost only proves the ineptitude of this administration. Moreover it shows how vulnerable we are by depending on a profit motivated health care system.
20
Hospitals will always send you the bill, hoping you will, out of fear or ignorance pay it - even if the bill is in error or completely unwarranted. Many hospitals will harass your family for payment after you have passed away - and are often successful in bullying people who do not realize they are not responsible for their deceased relative's medical bills.
Don't be afraid to fight them tooth and nail. Hospitals and doctors are often willing to take pennies on the dollar rather than nothing at all. Also, they almost always allow a patient who is willing to pay to construct their own payment schedule - draw it out for as many years as you can get away with. If all else fails, and you have reached the end of your rope - stiff them.
16
@Barbyr Doctors play the system just as well hoping to collect from Medicare and any other healthcare-related insurance you may have.
4
I cannot fathom why Americans are so opposed to making certain that all citizens have access to appropriate healthcare. Society benefits when workers can work, teachers can teach, and infected people have the freedom to call in sick and avoiding spreading disease. Every other industrialized nation has some form of universal medicine. There will be trade-offs, but any of the trade-offs in the usual suspects that are held up for comparison (Canada, Great Britain, Germany, Sweden) are far superior to people dying because of affordability of treatment. There are many models and many considerations to sort out - but, we couldn't possibly end up worse than we already are.
28
What occupies my mind is that this new viral attack on humanity may completely change the way we organize our economy in the United States. The gig society has made many more people dependent on working every day, whether they are sick or not. If they do not work, they do not get paid. And those who argue that every "able bodied adult" should work defend this ideology.
A sudden crippling disease changes that, however (I know because I have Multiple Myeloma and cannot work a full day due to the cancer induced fatigue). So "able bodied adults" can - at any age - be stopped in their tracks.
Now add up these two facts, i.e. having to pay for the medical care and quarantine and not receiving pay) and you can see how many people will avoid visiting a doctor to see if they have the virus.
Now, imagine these people interacting with society. Here we see how even the very rich might want to seek a solution for their poorer peers. For they, the rich, will have little or no protection from an air borne virus if they venture out of the bubble of their mansions. But even then, there would be their servants, the service people and repairmen, the gardeners and delivery people who, struggling with the aforementioned scenario, might breathe out air in their proximity.
Travel for the rich would then also be impossible, despite excellent healthcare plans and endless money to pay for treatment - the same with visiting a restaurant or the theater, classes, meetings, and more.
17
The CDC website lists just two ways to contain Covid 19: wash your hands a lot , and if you have symptoms, stay home. But how many Americans can afford to stay home when they're feeling a bit ill? Now is a great time to to institute universal paid sick days as well as universal health care, for all our sakes.
14
On co-pays
On the check in into the oncology center, stage III colon center, my wife and I had to sign a form for co-pays up to $ 22,000 before treatment would commence
No signature, no treatment.
25
With Medicare for all, will all the politicians be in the same boat too? They should!
13
@Mel
They must! They must be a part of the same health system as regular citizens
4
@L They ARE regular citizens
1
Other than media pieces about how most Americans don’t have the luxury to stay home from work, and this article, there hasn’t been much media coverage on the financial impact to US citizens from the cost of testing and treatment for the virus. I just assumed testing would be free if you were symptomatic. What a naive assumption! While those who have enough to invest in the stock market get real time information about their losses, the rest of us don’t have a clue or have to be “surprised” about health care costs. Please, focus more reporting (like this article) on the financial costs to the victims dealing with the virus. I know we don’t want to discourage anyone from getting the care or getting tested, but what will their lives be like with more debt or if they get fired from their job because of lost time?
18
So... Mr. Wucinski does not live, work, or pay taxes in the United States. He accepted the benefit of a free, taxpayer funded evacuation to the United States and on top of this expected completely free healthcare after having paid absolutely nothing into the system? Even many countries where "universal care" is offered simply do not function this way. I'm a citizen of one of them. If I stop paying taxes, I am no longer eligible for free care and am billed for all the time during which I did NOT pay upon my return and before I am once again eligible for care. Period. I've seen Mr. Wucinski interviewed and he pretty clearly has an agenda as well as a poor understanding of basic infectious disease protocols.
4
@Ariel As a citizen he has the right to come back to the states. It is in our interest to make sure he is disease free and that the costs are low/nil for him. Otherwise, it encourages people to hide possible exposure/not seek treatment. Moreover, the evacuation was optional but the quarantine was not. He was held by the government for the good of everyone. He should not have to pay. Your sense of fairness and who pays is beside the point. Making people pay will encourage much worse health outcomes in this situation.
12
If you are A US citizen, you pay US federal taxes no matter where you live, whether in US or not. That’s why some super-rich (e.g., one of the “accidental” Facebook co-founders, originally from Brazil) renounced his US citizenship and moved to Singapore a few years back.
13
@Jerry If you stay out of the country for most of the year, you do not pay taxes (if your income is not coming from U.S.).
2
As Americans do not pay OOP cash to the U.S. military for their national safety, Americans should not pay for any of the medical procedures to prevent and to control the virus, that is threatening the public health.
If we cannot reform the entirety of the U.S. healthcare system, we should at least try to introduce a partial medicare for all. The government should not turn the virus containment procedures for profit. That all-for-profit idea itself is becoming the most alarming national threat.
8
@SYK Its way past being a trend.Thats what it is!
The Wucinski family must have agonized over him taking their daughter to the US but reasonably assumed that she would be safer here. They found out, like many residents, that being an American citizen doesn't amount to much where health care is concerned.
And $2000+ for an ambulance ride? AMR should be sued (but won't be).
11
The coronavirus is making the case for Medicare For All. A for-profit health care system in which many are denied access will aid the spread of this virus and have the effect of making it more deadly. The United States, where most workers do not have sufficient paid sick days (if they have any at all), is a sitting duck.
11
This is an illustration of the risks that the novel corona-virus presents to a heath care system with spotty and poor health care coverage. There is a real risk that those who do not have, or have limited health care coverage will wait until it is too late to get medical assistance. This situation is the best friend of a virus capable of wreaking havoc on a population and economy.
6
Surprise health-care bills? Welcome to the "ambush economy", populated by the predators who've turned it into a business model – and who now count on the Republicans to protect their turf.
15
Best case scenario is that only several million people will face this viral/financial crisis. Hospitals and doctors could be taxed beyond capacity and then be unable to extract reimbursement from the recently infected or deceased. Bailout, a la auto industry? Otherwise known as government financed healthcare.
1
Sarah Kliff was an excellent hire by the times. She deserves all the journalism awards for her continued work on our medical system and medical bills.
Keep it up Ms. Kliff, you rock!
13
I can see what happend here, providing the facts are as presented: The gap here that caused this issue is as follows:
Government imposed quarantine.
When symptomatic, government evacuated patient to local medical pediatric facility.. which operates as a private healthcare provider. Government made absolutely no provisions to provide said care locally at the air base where the quarantine was taking place. Government exported the problem to a private health care facility to avoid liability, plain and simple.
Who pays now comes down to a round robin of government, private healthcare provider, patient, and patients private healthcare insurance. Government actions drove the costs incurred here, so government is liable for the expenses beyond the patients control. And NO.. private pediatric hospital should not carry the expense, nor should patients own healthcare insurance.
Now.. if the father requested or demanded pediatric care for his daughter in lieu of government provided medical care in quarantine... totally different story.. father carries the burden.
3
If universal care is good enough for Canada, it's good enough for America.
9
The responsible thing to do is to NOT pay the bill.
3
Americans have been duped for a century over healthcare. I live in the UK and my life has been saved twice by the NHS, both as child and adult. Cost to me? Zero. Not one penny. And I assure you my care was excellent.
Why cannot you people elect a government which will do something? Well, a simple answer. Money. In South America it is the drug traffickers which bribe politicians. In the US it is pharma and health insurers.
Tell me, what's the difference?
20
@G Rayns Many Americans are so brainwashed that the suggestion we implement universal healthcare or any other program that works in virtually every other country in the world is met with panic. That's socialism, and socialism leads to communism! (They don't know what either of these words mean.) If we don't bankrupt people when we need medical care, then we're automatically on the way to becoming an authoritarian communist country where everyone has to use the same toilet paper and the government will start shipping us off to gulags.
This is usually followed by some assertion that "socialists" don't know history and socialism never works, then a few quotes by Lenin or Marx. Finally, something about Cuba or Venezuela, which is bizarre because these people don't seem to be aware of the existence of other countries.
It's absolutely perplexing how many people respond like this and how resistant they are to new information. Even if the response isn't this hysterical and ignorant, many people still seem to instinctively respond as if the someone had suggested we all set ourselves on fire and jam forks in our eyes.
5
I lived in the UK when I was younger and once was taken to the doctor by my coworkers when I had a high fever. After the examination was over, I was given a prescription and told to go across the street and fill it at the Chemist. I took the script and stood there at the desk until someone finally turned and asked if I had another question. I said, “Yes. What do I owe you?” Everyone behind the desk turned and looked at me in confusion until someone said, “Nothing. You are sick!”
I went across the street to fill the prescription. Once it was handed to me, I stood there, waiting to be told what I owe, long enough for the man to say, “Is there something else you need?” Again, I said, “What do I owe you?” He looked at me in confusion and repeated what I just had heard at the doctor’s office, “Nothing. You are sick.”
At the time I took it as a cultural difference (and I was admittedly a bit out of it due to the fever).
Now, I see a fundamental difference. To those in Northern Ireland, they looked at a sick person and wanted to help because that’s what you do. They see health care as a human right.
Here? We clearly see some lives as worth more than others. And we clearly don’t see health care as a right.
“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?” Only if you can afford it in the US.
20
If everyone refuses to pay, and I would be among them, the government will pick up the tab. It would be suicide if the government did not pay for those tests it ordered - the Federal Government has no interest in bankrupting the local hospitals that it depends upon to keep our population healthy. It also has no interest in being overthrown.
3
Some of those hundreds of millions of Republican political donations should pay for it.
9
Yet another, and far from banal, example how it is laughable to think that this country is ready to manage this health crisis.
6
First they came for the HIV patients. but I was not one of them.
Then they came for the diabetics, but I was healthy.
Next they came for the freelancers, but I had insurance through my job.
Then...
This is a nightmare 50 years in the making and it's driving force has always been the ease with which one can take advantage of the weak and the sick.
Now that even the self-satisfied upper middle class suburban corporate professionals are threatened by our healthcare system will they feel empathy for the rest of us?
My guess is no, because they are arrogant are they not and never make mistakes so why should they rethink anything. Besides they'll say — THOSE PEOPLE... fill in the blank.
Yet they can all prove me wrong, and banish my considerable bitterness at watching all the horror stories hit my friends and families over the years by voting in primaries and the general election for candidates that support a Canadian style universal system.
9
Having worked in retail in a different part of my career, the comments about people without sick leave coming into work sick are spot-on.
In low-wage jobs when you get sick the question is how sick am I? If you can get out of bed, you show up to work because you need all the money you can get and the bills don't magically disappear because you are sick.
The lack of paid sick leave for low-wage jobs that involve working with the public is going to compound the problem and make it a lot harder to contain.
16
If the US had as good of a healthcare system as the UK, Canada, most of the EU or Australia, this would be a nonissue.
5
Out of pure curiosity, I would like to know the cost of and who paid for Melania Trump's week long stay at Walter Reed Military Hospital in DC in May of 2018, for what was described as an outpatient procedure.
If the government has the authority to mandate you be quarantined at a government run medical facility, government should cover the cost - all of it.
I'd bet good money the trump's didn't receive a bill from Walter Reed.
8
OMG !! I just realized --
What if I get the Cpovid-19 (or some other affliction) ?
Will I then have a Pre-Existing condition (another one) ?
Seems I'm on my own again, I'll just wait and take my chances... like so many / too many others will do....
1
So if I go to jail the government covers my health care costs but if I'm quarantined against my will without due process I'm on the hook? God were those 22-1/2 years that I spent in the Navy ever wasted.
3
After reading this story, which Democratic presidential candidate are you going to vote for?
Buttigieg - endorses a 'Medicare for all who want it' plan - sounds great and easy, NOT. Please read NYT https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/25/opinion/public-option-health-care.html
Plus, please read Paul Krugman's criticism(s) of Buttigieg's embracing the 'deficits are bad' philosophy promoted by those (read Republicans) as a reason to slash programs like Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP, etc, etc.
Biden, Klobuchar - expand ACA - also sounds like great fix and easy, NOT.
At present, an estimated 44 million Americans are without health insurance.
Additionally, nearly half of the American population is either uninsured or underinsured.
Who does that leave?
Bernie - Medicare for all. Too vague for you? Too radical for you?
Elizabeth Warren - Medicare for all as the goal. Yes, it is accomplished via higher taxes for nearly everyone. I'm all for higher taxes in lieu of co-pays, premiums and limits on benefits.
If you like the current system, if you enjoyed reading this story .....vote for Trump.
6
@TMM The higher taxes for a universal healthcare system wont look so bad compared to being bankrupted by the exorbitant costs incurred under our current system.
6
I would.... first thought , thankful ! alive and free from the deadly virus .
Second thought ... thankful for those that risked their lives to care for me .
Third thought ... contact Hospital to negotiate this debt , because often they will reduce the debt ,help make arrangements for payments and give info for programs that may help .
Contact the government to see what they are going to do about this .
Write letters to state Senators . Form a group with others that are burdened with this debt .
Vote for people that will help , not just saying they will .
When to get scared , when to panic
When someone you actually know gets the Corona virus you can get scared ( this probably will not happen)
When to panic : when someone you know dies from it.
Do you know anybody that has it ?
So relax , be cautious and trust in modern science
I'm sorry, but we recently had to make a trip to the local ER...)my husband ruptured a disc, was in a wheelchair, and needed a cat scan_..we stood for 6.5 hours, with a room full of sick people, had a scan, was told to see our doctor, and left. Bill: $191.00 for scan (very reasonable), but $9,000.00 for ER services......so, Mr. Wuchinski, a personal flight from China to the US, two weeks in a specialized unit, toys, etc........sorry, you could have stayed in China....what price then?
1
Only in America! Our system is archaic, inhumane, and immoral. We actually allow people to go untreated and die. This virus could spread more so because of our miserable health insurance system which will make sick people afraid they'll go bankrupt if they seek treatment.
14
This is absolutely insane. Fear of bills is going to spread the COVID-19 virus much more quickly and widely. This is a disaster unfolding.
11
The situation in the USA is pathetic.Many people just don’t get it that most people who are preparing or serving your food in restaurants don’t have health insurance and they are a source for infecting others. This of course includes fast food restaurants too.
Grocery stores prepare your food too......more infecting.
The situation will only get worse as time goes by......
8
Just another way TrumpCare, our non-health system will bankrupt working families to keep down wages for those who serve the rich.
5
It is Obvious that the time is here for the all Americans to
have health care coverage that should be comprehensive and the same for each person.
There should not be need for pre-authorizations, co-pays, co-insurances or any deterrent to seeking care.
This is done in many countries who don't pat themselves on the back -- these countries take care of their citizens.
We must have Universal Health Care Coverage in this country.
How we achieve the Universal Coverage can be discussed by health experts, presented to Congress and educate everyone in the country. Then this can be achieved by Medicare 4 All orprivate/public options ----- as long as the coverage is comprehensive and equal to everyone.
We must achieve this goal very soon.
In the face of this coronavirus emergency no person should avoid seeking care because they can't pay for care.
Call and write every congress person to demand bills are passed to pay for all medical care related to coronavirus.
Nov. 3rd Vote !
Vote Blue for Whoever is Demacratic candidate !
8
and do-nothing-donald says don’t panic?
he guts obama care, defunds research, lies and spins, contradicts experts, and then he blames the media and the democrats.
Mr. President, I’ll panic if I want to AND I’ll vote you out in November, no matter what nonsense dribbles out of your mouth.
13
Are you reading this American voters?
4
Please Universal healthcare fast ! No more deductible...no more premiums...no more bills!
6
Oh but let's continue to hammer away at taking healthcare away and/or making it so unaffordable that uninsured, sick people won't seek treatment because they need to get to their three jobs. Shame on those dastardly Democrats for creating this hoax!
2
The American health care system is expensive, immoral and absurd. That is no surprise as it is supported and kept going by Republicans who are both morally corrupt and dumb. Many of them call themselves Christians when they are in fact heretics as their vote for Trump shows. The most irritating claim they make, however, is that they are patriots. In reality they do not care at all for America because they do not care for her people. This is a society where everybody is on their own and nobody will step in to help you if factors completely out of your control suddenly destroy your life. That is not a basis for a society or an association of people. This country is not your or mine. It belongs to nobody because it does not even exist.
3
@The Hawk, American Exceptionalism in a nutshell.
Frank Wucinski sure is making the media rounds. He's the same guy who was on Fox News coughing through his interview. Now he's in the NY Times lamenting about the cost of healthcare. America in a nutshell.
2
Yesterday the Guardian carried the story of know nothing Ted Cruz and his confrontation with the math and science literate AOC.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/28/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-ted-cruz-coronavirus
I read French and English newspapers as well as newspapers from Europe and the middle.
If I need American newspapers but mostly the NYT to find out what is going on in America.
The corona virus is not Amerocentric even as healthcare seems to be center to US coverage.
I suspect as or if the is a global pandemic I will be spending much less time exploring US media.
I remember when we told how smart the know nothing Senator from Texas was.
I know America's media is not equipped to handle truth. This story tells me all I need to know about why this foreigner would just as well see complete American isolationism as any of the outstanding Democrats enter the oval office. Like rabies the gaslighting of America's media has made coronavirus a mental illness.
2
Time to leave the USA. Surely we can now apply for asylum in other countries given our government’s failure to protect us from the coming public health disaster that is COVID-19? That anyone would have the gall to bill someone put into mandatory quarantine is insulting, shameful and disgusting. Who are we????? What have we allowed ourselves as a nation to become? Because the thing is, we elected these awful, narcissistic government representatives that are allowing this to happen. I guess this poor guy and his wife might have made the wrong choice choosing the USA over China.
1
Stay on this story Times. We need you.
5
Pray and ask god to pay the bills !
1
That people are expected to pay for any expenses, including medical tests and equipment and hospital stays, resulting from government-mandated isolation is appalling. And what about people who aren't paid while in quarantine and have no money for food, rent and utilities. What is government for, if not to provide for and protect the common good in an emergency? I hope this cruelty, mismanagement, incompetence and indifference from the federal government causes trump and his idiot minions to crash and burn. At least something good could come from all this.
8
Hey, here’s a thought! All that mis-appropriated money being thrown at the border wall, how about directing some to ASAP making masks and getting ahead of this upcoming pandemic?
1
Ah yes, my Chickadee - the American way of health and medicine in the USA! Have lots of money - get the best insurance. Have little money - start prepaying for your funeral.
5
the Govt. has given (was anxious to) billions in ytax breaks to the very wealthy and corporations -
in such cases (mandantory ........ confinement and medical testing etc), Clearly our Govt. must accept and resolve the Costs to Citizens affected!!
1
Guys don't worry Pence is going to Pray the Virus away. Have trust on the man, no more bills. JMO
2
Trump is wanting to close the Mexican border to defend against Corona because he thinks its that darn Mexican beer that is responsible for spreading this virus - if only people would drink domestic Coors or Bud instead - then the US would be safe.
2
So whenever a pandemic threatens to wipe put civilization, greed will continue, at least until the last hospital money bagsucks in their last breath?
My guess is Mexico is going to pay for it.
1
Vote for Bernie Sanders!!! $2600 just for the ambulance! (Umm I think I will Uber to the hospital instead) This country is out of control! Health industry monster has to be reined in. Enough is enough!!!
4
Too bad we wasted all those billions on that stupid Wall.
And now,Trump can't close that border because, with the markets tanking, he can't affrd to loose the billions of dollars of commerce that flows across the border, commerce that in part employs Americans on THIS side of the wall.
Electing an imbecile has consequence.
3
Outrageous! Obviously, a person held in mandatory isolation by the government should not have to pay for their care during that period. Ridiculous!
3
“The Guardian” has an article “’To hell and back’: my three weeks suffering from coronovirus” by Tiger Ye, a 21-year-old Chinese man who came down with COVID-19.
He was ill for three weeks with symptoms much like flu—whole body aches, fever, chills, cough—except for what happened to his lungs, which showed the signature, white, “broken glass” striations of coronavirus infection, and left him struggling to breathe. His doctors gave him Kaletra—a drug used to treat HIV—as well as intravenous fluids.
My understanding from other articles is that China, after initially having COVID-19 patients charged as usual through whatever insurance they had, is now providing coronavirus treatment for FREE.
I looked up Kaletra online -- $544.10 for 160 milliliters. I have no idea how much Kaletra was needed to treat Tiger Ye, but all I could think was that three weeks of care (blood tests, two CT scans, IV-drip, two coronovirus tests, and the HIV antiviral medicines) would cost thousand of dollars in the US.
This was the experience of an apparently otherwise healthy, young man—three weeks of illness that required a lot of care.
So, President Trump and Vice President Pence, please do what China did and announce that the US government will provide testing and treatment for FREE.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/29/to-hell-and-back-my-three-weeks-suffering-from-coronavirus
3
This is absolutely sickening. Shame on my country.
4
Only in America. Short-term stupidity accelerating long-term problems. Coronavirus as a profit center.
Good idea.
2
Conclusion: The bills were a mistake. Sorry you had to read the whole boring thing to find that out.
12
Perhaps the bills became a mistake when the story made the national news.
7
@Dennis Byron
They only called them a mistake when they realized the NYTimes was publicizing this.
7
@ Dennis Byron
They were determined to be a mistake when the NY Times inquired. It would be interesting to know if they would have been called a mistake when the patient asked.
5
The United States picked up the expenses of flying the Wucinski and his daughter home from China and provided then quarantine quarters at Marine Corps Station Miramar. Why did Wucinski also assume the U.S. government would cover his medical expenses?
3
@William Case I assume because the costs were for health services that served a broader public interest and were mandated by the Government. This is a collective issue, i.e. PUBLIC health. What's so hard to understand about that?
33
@William Case
Because the hospital stays were mandated by the government. It also seems to me to make perfect sense that if the government is mandating you to go for treatment at the hospital in order to contain a virus and the spread of a pandemic, a) you do so b) you assume the government mandating you to seek the health treatment also has a plan to cover the costs c) every other country who has been dealing with Covid19 has had just such systems in place - smart governments pay for their citizen's healthcare so that they can contain the spread.
19
That’s not true. While U.S. Government makes the seats available to US citizens passengers are still charged certain amount and sign papers to repay the government.
5
This is, no doubt, an American tragedy. But would "Medicare for all" be the best remedy? Why can't we have a system similar to the ones in Germany and Switzerland, where people have a choice to buy private insurance if they wish (or can afford) too. Or, would that be an affront to our oddly egalitarian idea that Everyone should have the same care, whether they pay for it or not. That concept doesn't work in the supermarket or car dealership--why should it work in health care?
11
@Cazanueva - Not comparable to supermarkets and car shopping. People aren't choosing bananas over pears or Porsches over Fords. They're are choosing whether to make their fellow people (citizen or not) I'll, possibly to the point of death. That is a social concern, and a higher one than likes or dislikes of produce or vehicles.
Economically, companies have to decide how to support the people in and around them of they have sick people on their payroll. What is the "reasonable accommodation" when there is a medical condition that is best treated/contained/managed with distancing? That's the other side of corporations being people. They owe their society some things.
11
@Cazanueva
It is not clear that Medicare for all is or would be the correct solution, unless reimbursement rates are modified. Comparing this situation to the supermarket or the car dealership is a fundamental misunderstanding of the role that medical care has in life. When you, or your loved ones gets seriously ill, the ONLY thing you are concerned with is getting healthy. That means you want to have the best facilities possible. It is NOT the same as ordering a car with a decent radio or one with a superb stereo system. to compare the two is to completely misunderstand the role that health care plays.
Your suggestion of supplementing the public system with private insurance is practical and followed by a large number of countries.
@Cazanueva We have had the system you describe for decades now. It is called Medicare 'Advantage', where hundreds of insurance companies currently provide Medicare Benefits for over 40% of Medicare beneficiaries today. Obviously you are not familiar with how our Sick Care system operates.
In hindsight, it appears that the US government evacuating citizens living and working abroad is a questionable use of taxpayer money. When we choose to live or travel abroad we should be financially responsible for our medical care, and either accept wat is available in the locale or be prepared to foot the costs for evacuation. Insurance for this is available.
6
@JF No, you are wrong and wrong headed. Many military families and civil servants live abroad, serving our country. People work abroad, travel abroad, but still pay US taxes, maintain citizenship, and vote. Americans stand by and support Americans; that's the purpose of the common bond of citizens of a nation of people. Reread the Preamble to the Constitution if you are still not clear what it means to be an American.
31
@JF - Just saying that, someday you might be using hindsight on a situation you are in. Plus, I wanna meet the person who was planning on being evacuated because of a potentially deadly illness. It's kinda tough to plan for every contingency. Best to you in the future.
3
@JF - The Fed created $500 billion (repo and QE) from 2019/11 through 2020/1 to support stock market prices and consumer sentiment leading up to the election. Smoke and mirrors, now it is all either in the pockets how were postioned to get out at the top, or vanished into a black hole of collapsing equity. How many more hundreds of billions will be wasted similarly in the following months?
You are counting pennies while the gold is getting carted out in wheelbarrows.
You are counting pennies while the insiders are carting out wheelbarrows
3
Remember the Maine!!!
Way Back in 1898.....the Yellow Press Corps used this event to inflame Americans into turning on the Spanish Empire, invading Cuba....and establishing Guantanamo as the Torture Chamber that it remains to this day.
The abuse of logic and reason was so embarrassing, that Joe Pulitzer,(himself one of the worst offenders) created a Prize to give the semblance of professionalism to the career field of Journalism.....basicly seen as little more than rumour mongering and sensationalism, manipulating the reader to buy some bogus idea.
Today?
The Yellow Press Corps Screams........
"CoronaVirus!!! WE must defeat Trump!!!!"
A half dozen times times each month I receive a financial statement from my insurer informing me that I have an absolute right to not understand the statement they have just sent me in any of seventeen languages, as well as English.
Unfortunately, simply providing universal, single payer health care will not solve many of our problems. Bureaucracy and butt covering are bureaucracy and butt covering whether they are privately or governmentally run. What is necessary is to skip the bumpersticker "policies" and, instead, identify the real-world problems, and then build a system carefully from the bottom up. This must also include ways to increase the qualified doctors available in rural and other underserved communities. Such will take time and a genuine sense of humility on everyone's part.
3
This story is the perfect illustration of the main reason I have refused for years to get a colonoscopy. Going to an American hospital or clinic is like signing a blank check to them.
@sansay A colonoscopy for a well person over 50 is a free service, as are all preventive services for anyone in the US that has any kind of insurance( Medicaid, Medicare, commercial i.e. Obamacare). And even if you are walking around with no insurance ( not allowed here in MA which has has subsidized plans for those who can’t get through an employer) you can find exactly what it will cost you beforehand. Far less that the cost of treating colon cancer, I assure you.
1
Voting matters, so does common sense. No sympathy here, ask tRump for help. But you better wear your little red hate and pledge fielty to the traitor.
Of course the government should pay. It is the one who forced those people to remain in the hospital based not on medical evidence but fear.
Hospitals and doctors are going to start looking to the government to pick up the tab because it's so much easier than getting individuals with no means to pay. Can't wait for those appropriations bills to start hitting the Senate. It's all about personal responsibility after all.
3
This is why we need universal health care like every other major first world country. If there is an outbreak of Coronavirus, it will spread more quickly if the millions of people who don't have insurance don't seek medical treatment because they can't afford it.
13
@Sallie It always astounds me how people, who are getting Social Security and have to use Medicare hate the idea of socialized medical insurance. I'm retired and use Medicare. It is unobtrusive and my total medical out of pocket is less than a tenth of the total costs of my care.
4
“Medical bills related to govt. mandated actions”-completely UNACCEPTABLE. My tax dollars pay for Air Force One fuel that ferry Trump from rally to rally. Better the money be spent on dealing with this national public health emergency. No one should pay to be screened or to be treated. Containment and patient recovery should be priority #1.
42
This is why we need brilliant people in essential government positions. The current administration fails to meet expectations, much less has solutions for problems like this.
17
I have great, great medical coverage through my employer (a major hospital), so I am very thankful for that.
2
@Nycdweller I hope it's not like mine, BCBS, which tries to duck every bill they get.
1
The government does not charge for prison stays, this is the equivalent and they may have to sue to set the precedent. This was not a voluntary confinement.
21
@James MD urologist -Actually James, the government does charge for prison stays. Most inmates, even those incarcerated for short periods while awaiting trial are sent a bill upon their release.
1
@Sallie In Pennsylvania,they keep you on Parole till you pay off fines, costs and cost of both being in jail and being on parole and will re-jail you quick if you stop paying.Sort of indentured servitude for felons!
1
This government must pay or reimburse for these costs. This is a pandemic and this is when we citizens need relief. Set up a fund.
We workers are the backbone of this economy. If the government doesn’t help with these expenses, you’ll see a real economic collapse.
We won’t seek help if we have symptoms and therefore won’t be tested.
Where’s the Red Cross in this crisis?
16
This is a topical illustration why healthcare needs to be provided for ALL, and not rely on personal calculations and decisions by INDIVIDUALS whether to purchase it, or insurance, for themselves.
Unlike other non-contagious misfortunes - personal accidents, flood, earthquake etc., the consequences of a public health related problem are borne by the PUBLIC.
Those who do not have heath insurance, or who have skimpy coverage, are more likely to try to grit it out, with disastrous consequences to the rest.
Therefore, the PUBLIC needs to be protected from the personal miscalculations of INDIVIDUALS in such cases.
In circumstances like the present, the blissful complacency, falsely reassured by the healthcare premium deduction on the paychecks for those who purchase it, is just that.
One needs to worry more about those who are unwilling or unable to have secure healthcare.
33
@pathrose This gentleman and his family had health insurance where he worked in China. He was evacuated on an emergency basis to the United States. How was he supposed to get coverage in the United States on such short notice while on a plane from China. The larger issue is that people will avoid testing and avoid going to the doctor so that they do not end up in isolation for weeks trying to figure out how they are going to pay for the inevitable bills. THAT is a public health emergency for everybody.
33
@pathrose One only needs to go to their local DMV office to see how government run healthcare would be where everyone gets national health care run by the Gubment. People would still be in line on the sidewalk as the lines are wrapped around city blocks for days just to get tested to find out nothing was wrong.
3
Take a trip to New Zealand to see how it’s done. Health care is excellent and free of charge. No lines & no paperwork. We used to live in the USA. We would be crazy if we returned.
3
My father works at a company with one of the best health care insurance plans. Employees were told that if anyone became infected with the virus, he/she first needs to use sick day leaves, then tap into short term disability and then long term disability. My dad is a scientist and works in the lab. This is our society having no common sense, no right response and remediation policies, and no ability to deal with public health crisis. Imagine for individuals in organizations with less stellar health insurance or having no health insurance at all. We have a huge problem, and no policy makers, elected officials or presidential candidates inspire any confidence in dealing with issues that directly affect each one of us. We each need to call our representatives and hold all of accountable to work on issues that matter for our everyday lives.
42
You're absolutely correct - until everyone's local Representative and Senators think this important enough an issue that their jobs are at risk unless they do something about it, they will continue to do nothing about it.
19
Furthermore, I live in NYC and it seems people are not aware of what is happening or could happen. I see people continue to play games and check Instagrams etc (myself included). If we all/each take a few min and call our elected officials at local, state, and congressional levels to ask common sense questions and hold them accountable. This is a moment for taking up personal responsibility to help ourselves and others. It is very clear from most of the comments that we all know what might happen in the U.S. if we don't press governments to further step up.
9
@NYTReader,
The problem extends beyond health insurance and into the the lack of paid sick leave--a lot of jobs don't provide sick leave in the U.S.
The problem should obvious: people without sick-leave are less likely to heed the advice to stay home--if you don't work they don't get paid and bills don't magically stop becoming due because you are sick.
This problem is particularly pronounced in low-wage jobs like in the retail or restaurant industries--plenty of people come to work sick because the wages are so low they need every dollar they can get and cannot afford to miss too many days.
The fact that many of these jobs involve working directly with the public compounds the problem--combining people who come into work sick with working with the public provides a perfect vector for the spread of illness.
5
The argument for privately-held insurance has just been shown to be vacuous — the economic incentive for those with a private plan is to not report any symptoms so that they aren’t forcibly admitted and then forced to pay. The spread of the virus will then increase, shutting down the free market economy. Where are the champions of a non-governmental health system? I just hear deafening silence.
Actually socialist medical care makes more sense to save the free enterprise system (how rich!) We have it already — Medicare. Why not expand it to pay for coronavirus-related care? It could easily be paid for by raising the capital gains tax rate to that of wages.
46
You don’t make any sense. People pay Medicare taxes while working and then insurance premiums when retired, and they’re responsible for 20% of costs under traditional Medicare. They often buy gap insurance coverage from private insurers. Medicare Advantage programs are mostly run by the for-profit insurers. The poor elderly often receive Medicaid. Many states actually hire for-profit insurers to run their Medicaid programs for the poor and disabled.
So this isn’t socialist medical care like in Cuba, where everything is owned and operated by the state. Socialism means state ownership and control of an industry. Private insurers are already heavily involved in Medicare and Medicaid.
9
@J Thank you for your comment. I am tired of people who think Medicare for all means medical care is free. It isn't even for those of us on Medicare. Medicare is a multi tiered system where those of us on it have paid into the system and continue to do so over our life time. Nothing is FREE. We all have skin in the game to some extent. Once a person hits 65 he or she has choices to make - go with original Medicare that they have paid for during their work life, pay a premium for continued coverage and supplement it or not. When Bernie Sanders proclaims Medicare for all I am not sure what he is talking about - everyone has to have worked to qualify. And they have to pay premiums - if he means, health care for all with premium payments then, fine.
15
@J Medicare for all is a single payer system, not Medicare as we know it today. No copays or deductibles, with automatic coverage from birth to death--like Canada's system which pays half as much per person per year as we do.
NOT government run, just government paid for. Everyone is covered without fear of medical debt. Good for public health and the common good. Cheaper because private insurance is no longer taking a big chunk out of the health care dollar.
This is working in almost every industrialized country. Our system is broken and outdated and frankly worrisome in the recent public health scare. 27 million uninsured. What could possibly go wrong?
13
This is a reminder that our medical system is based on institutionalized (legal) fraud for how charge rates are determined and applied.
75
Our health care system is nothing of the sort, it's a system to take money from your wallet and put it in the accounts of hospital, insurance, and pharmaceutical VIPs. Folks will avoid seeking care over fear of the bills, just like they do for the old fashioned flu, sore throats, sprained ankles, etc. On the other hand plenty of folks who never pay their bills treat ERs like it's a casual trip to the candy store, I've seen it all as an ER physician.
That said, this individual chose to repatriate himself, knowing he was covered in China and not covered in America. I'm sorry but at least for the time being, nothing is free. The quarantine was mandatory, but only after he accepted the offer to evacuate, which was not mandatory.
Unclear why an X-ray was ordered as neither showed signs of pneumonia. A little girl coughing isn't sufficient reason. But doctors love over ordering tests knowing that somehow the bill gets paid, and they're not the ones directly paying, nor are they the ones exposed to the unnecessary radiation.
Lastly, when did marriage stop automatically making an American citizen's spouse one too?
23
@Ignatius J. Reilly
Last question first: Marriage has never automatically made a citizen's spouse one too. The spouse has to apply for citizenship, and waiting periods apply. The spouse is eligible to live in the U.S., but must apply for and undergo naturalization to become a citizen.
For lots of folks without insurance, the ER is the only place they can get care, and many of those folks cannot get insurance. Texas and some other states have still not expanded their medicaid coverage, despite the ACA. An expanded ACA, with guaranteed full coverage for all residents, would take care of the problems you cite here.
Mr. Wucinski and others had little time to decide to evacuate or not, and may not have even known they had a choice. He had a small child to consider, and the infection was spreading rapidly in the city.
The X-rays in fact were probably ordered because someone created a protocol for health care workers to follow. Fever, take these steps. Cough, take these steps. Fever and cough, take these steps. Your citations of over testing are absolutely right on, and over treating also is a real problem, but they may not apply in this case.
24
of course medical care is not free, but this is a public health threat requiring a response that will send a message that people can trust the authorities. bankruptcy is a disincentive.
7
@Ignatius J. Reilly -- "when did marriage stop automatically making an American citizen's spouse one too?"
It never did, and less often now than before.
This is a major problem.
3
"After their release from quarantine, Mr. Wucinski and his daughter went to stay with his mother in Harrisburg, Pa. That’s where they found a pile of medical bills waiting: $3,918 in charges from hospital doctors, radiologists and an ambulance company."
Yet another example of why America needs a universal single-payer healthcare system. Under single-payer there would be no confusion whatsoever about who would pay, nor a dispute as to whether the hospitalization was needed.
What needs explaining is why, when universal single-payer healthcare is so desperately needed in America, The Times continues to flood its pages with grossly misleading articles about single-payer, and splashes right-wing pundits' anti-Sanders screeds across every issue.
Let's see a response to this Upshot article by the anti-Sanders pundits David Brooks and Ross Douthat and others. Let them explain why we need to keep the current system that saddles the Wucinski family with thousands of dollars in medical bills that aren't there fault.
33
@Sean
No, this is an example of why those who comment need to read the article thoroughly before posting. He was given a government email where he could send any bills he might receive. He has not done so. Instead he has chosen to complain and others have decided this is why single payer healthcare is needed. The government said they will pay the bills, he just hasn’t bothered to send them in.
1
@Emma This story isn’t why I decided America needs a Single Payer system- I have believed it for many years. Why should we hang onto a system that costs 3 times as much as any other comparable country, and delivers dramatically less coverage to its citizens? Why?
2
@todd sf And ranked #38 in outcomes!
1
Our President says he loves the ‘poorly educated ‘
He basically means the poor and under-educated
Not sure whether they will love him after this outbreak
20
@Uday He loves them because they're more easily exploited and manipulated. He loves them like low hanging fruit.
5
Just let that "fabulously wealthy" so-called ruler King TWIT (aka Trump the "great manager") dig into his (not as deep as he pretends) pockets and cover the costs that HE MANDATED!
If not, as he would say, "You're fired!"
(I wouldn't even suggest that the great Christian and manager of the crisis Pence the Fence pay for this...he's too "christian" to support people he helped to impoverish with a MANDATED quarantine.
15
Universal healthcare, anyone?
38
No thanks
@Nycdweller why not? In Canada we pay high taxes on booze, cigarettes, gasoline...but having free medical for all is worth it
4
@Nycdweller Why not? Why should we defend a healthcare system that costs 3 times what other comparable country’s pay, yet covers dramatically fewer of its citizens?
2
Bill the stable genius.
23
@rip. “Bill the stable genius.”
But his name is Don....
Gee ! If only all Americans had publicly paid healthcare. Naw ! That would be Socialist! Can't have that.
35
The government shouldn’t pay his medical bills that’s socialism! Communists! We will turn into Venezuela!
American exceptionalism? More like American stupidity. Well funded government social programs protect the general health and well-being of the public. This is logical, this is sound, and this is possible.
A pandemic is coming and people can’t afford to go to the doctor. The USA need socialized medicine. Now.
M4A.
42
Trump and co will be deciding who has the ventilators ripped out of them by their loyalty pledge page on Facebook.
16
They said to stock up on meds. I have good insurance but used up my supply I asked how much my meds would cost without insurance. $300 . That is for a med used by millions. We need healthcare not Repiglican who sued to take away the ACA. The rich want us all to die so they can have more money. Even the rich need the poor to clean their toilets.
22
@Roger Its hard to stock up on med.s The insurance co.s allow you to fill only one month's worth of medicines at a time, and not until, it's been a month since prior fill.
4
@Roger I thought of this also when I learned that we should stock up medications. Who can afford this, when you have all those your insurance will pay for until next month?
3
@semaj II It's because they need the option of raising the price every month.
1
The FUD factor: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. Don't trust science, trust only Trump and his toadies. Don't travel. Stay in place (in all sorts of meanings)! And money is to be made at all levels of middlemen to order this to pass without any cure or respite!
Is this the United States, or the perfection of corporate fascism/authoritarianism?
15
@Carl Ian Schwartz This is corporate raiders of america
It's time to take back our country from corrupt healthcare profiteers
26
Typical leftist propaganda. Everyone knows that we have the best medical system in the world and that everyone loves their insurance plan. We will not give in to socialists who want to restrict doctors’ and ambulance providers’ right to charge whatever they want. If you want so save money, just be smart and don’t get sick!
8
@Slacker Thanks for the laugh.
1
Great irony!
1
@Slacker: I wrote a rebuttal to your comment until I realise it was sarcastic.
1
For all the readers commenting , 'why he has not written to the email address he was given?" He has...
Cut and paste from the NYT article, we have all read....
"He did receive a document upon leaving quarantine directing him to contact a government email address with any medical bills. He sent an email on Feb. 24 detailing the charges and asking what would be done.
“My question is why are we being charged for these stays, if they were mandatory and we had no choice in the matter?” Mr. Wucinski wrote in his message.
He has not received a response, he said. "
10
@rosalba while my sympathies are with universal healthcare (devil in details) i would like to point out that it's been less than a week since the email was sent. This isn't a timeframe which yet justifies any assumptive outrage. The gentleman, currently with time on his hands should follow up. And include in all emails clear and specific requests for expected actions, with numbered or bullet pointed items, no more than 2 of them if possible. On the other end of the email is a person, and people don't read and remember. They deal with the first thing they can, then move onto the next. Send separate emails for each medical bill, and request confirmation that the email was received then respond with a request for timetable for constructive response. I expect no less need for ownership of one's healthcare with a universal system, as well.
4
@rosalba Why? Maybe because you chose to live abroad in a country voluntarily, (he wasn't drafted) and then chose (luckily for him others are still there that weren't able to get out) without thinking he could infect other citizens in the US when he returned? What sort of person assumes he has free reign to return from a major outbreak of infectious disease and have the tax payers foot the bill?
Maybe the coronavirus will infect the outrageously health care executives who want to exploit this crisis. That would be Mother Nature's justice.
14
When is the USA going to get universal coverage as all other modern countries have? Oh thats right you are fixated that it might be "socialism".
21
This is ridiculous. The government can detain anyone on suspicion of being sick, I get that. Then they pass the cost on to the detainees? Doesn’t sound like an act of the richest most powerful country. More like a country that’s poor and weak.
27
@AG
The article says the man was given an email address where any bills could be sent. How was the cost passed on to him?
1
@Emma
Uh, he got the bills! You've apparently never received 6 figure hospital bills, have you? With your name on it? "Due upon receipt".
You should try it sometime. Yes, my wife was a heart transplantee and I am currently being treated for lung cancer (something about exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam), so I HAVE gotten bills for $300,000 and $135,000, and, oh, here's another one for $135,000!
5
Just think, if Bernie or Liz were president, maybe people wouldn't be afraid to go to a hospital when they were sick... and when they might infect others...
Sounds like socialism to me.
13
If Bernie Sanders were president, no one would ever get sick ever again.
3
@Robert
They would get less sick since there would be no lobbyist-designed system that incentivizes avoiding health care expenses.
What they wouldn’t get is broke from being sick.
3
Covid19 knowns no borders, pays no deductible and jumps out of network with impunity.
15
The coronavirus is the biggest advertisement against tRumps and the GOPs anti-universal healthcare plank, and they know it. No wonder thief trying to blame the Democrats. I think that the electorate, once they get these “wrong “ bills Bernie will have the biggest landslide than any president.
7
Perhaps Ivanka and her siblings can help with the money they skimmed from their fake charities?
19
The Republican Health Care Plan can be summed up as “Pay up or Die” . I guess all those evangelical supporters think Jesus should only have only cured those who had paid hefty premiums first.
30
@Jason Or more accurately "Don't get sick or hurt."
1
I strongly urge anyone who is being subjected to mandatory hospital stays, quarantine, or testing to refuse to pay ANYTHING. The minute a precedent is set of people paying out of their own pockets, well, that is a cat we will never be able to put back in the bag.
Just say no, folks. And then say it again, and again.
If I am unfortunate enough to be caught up in one of these situations, either getting sick or just being told to quarantine, I am happy to isolate myself at home. If they insist on anything other than that, then it is going to be on their bloody dime.
17
This is a commendable suggestion. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to take the credit bureaus into consideration. I’m not sure you understand the prison that has been painted around each member of the general population at this point in time.
5
I just heard the Vice President of the United States say that Democrats want millions to die so Trump would be hurt. Speechless does not cover our reaction.
28
@Beth That's the guy that trump assigned the task of managing the epidemic. Smart move, he couldn't have found anyone more willing to lie and try to make political hay out of the situation.
3
This is mere extortion.
9
@Jean-Claude Arbaut Yes, absolutely it's extortion, but in the United States it's also business as usual, and Republicans wouldn't have it any other way. Be glad you live in France.
2
The American healthcare system is the best example of the country’s profits before people culture.. and the massively corrupt crony capitalist government.
25
Trump and Congress want to spend billions on "combating" this virus. How about including the people who are providing those billions of dollars, American taxpayers? Especially as this is Govt mandated? America spend trillions on special interests groups, an ineffectual border wall, companies/farms effected by Trump's trade wars, but it's "socialist" when it comes to caring for Americans basic need of healthcare? Wake up and stop accepting the spoon fed hypocrisy, folks! You're being duped into voting against your own needs and interests!
26
We have an agency to handle all this. The U S Public Health Service. They wear uniforms and operate, or maybe used to operate, hospitals to quarantine merchant mariners and folks who needed to be isolated upon arrival to the U S. The hospital in Boston was called the “Brighton Marine Hospital.” It May still be there?
Am I the only person who remembers this stuff???
4
Um ... we still have Obamacare, right? His situation has changed so he would qualify.
2
@Blair Fell
We still have several disjointed pieces of the ACA thanks to Gorsuch, and Judge, Timmy and Squi.
1
@Blair Fell Even if he got an Obamacare policy (enrollment closed until next fall), would it pay retroactively ... I would say no.
@Blair Fell not sure if his short residency would impact his ability to join, his daughter may not even have an SS number and don't know if PA participates. Also, insurance doesn't cover past care. Many unknowns to jump to your conclusion.
2
Ro Khanna (D-CA) recently said that it might cost $25B to fight the Coronavirus epidemic. With over 25 million people uninsured and millions more underinsured, the only way to guarantee that people will go to doctors and hospitals when sick is to make such visits and carefree to the patients. Otherwise, sick people will avoid detection leading to a continuing epidemic that has many more people sick and dying while the country grinds to a halt!!!
15
Like Italian (european) citizen I think this is foolish. Medicare is neither Communism neither Socialism. It should be a pivot of every civil community.
28
Enough with this broken healthcare system.
Enough.
17
Never in Universal Health Care Sweden.
Only in America.A $3,918 bomb dropped on a family. I wonder which political party that family supports.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
19
@Larry Lundgren Hi I just arrived from China to Sweden, I wanted to come to your country because I heard they have great health care for all. Am I allowed to enter without quarantine, and if I am quarantined, will all my hospital bills be covered?
@Larry Lundgren Your a very lucky man Larry. As a recent recipient of your excellent healthcare system, via a fall and concussion in Stockholm (ambulance ride, stitches, and an overnight hospital stay- total bill $400.00 US) I will be forever grateful to your country- perhaps once the Full effects of this pending crisis becomes apparent, more of my fellow citizens will understand the advantages of your country’s system.
3
Perhaps this example shows why the young people in the US have lost faith in the type of capitalism so many defend to the death, so to speak....
21
Send your bills to dt, I hear he always makes good on those he owes money to.
13
Did anyone who commented here actually read the article?
-- The bills were a mistake, according to the article.
-- Anyone that received a bill was given a number to contact, according to the article.
5
@Dennis Byron But what reaction they got when they called that number, we don't know.
7
@StarLawrence true, nor the time frame promised for response. too soon to assume a bad outcome or a good one.But as for reading comprehension as of this article's publication, only some of the bills were termed an error, not the ambulance charges, or the xray and more may yet show up.
4
@Dennis Byron Did you read further? $2598 ambulance transport bill. $90 for radiologists.
2
Ever since President Trump was elected I have been trying to understand the conservative mindset. How’s this?
The US government took Mr. Wucinski out of Wuhan China, possibly saving his life. Instead of being grateful, his is whining because it wasn’t free. I didn’t tell Mr. Wucinski to go into the epicenter of a plague. That was his mistake and I and other taxpayers should not have to pay for it.
Also, the author of the article implies that if such quarantines and treatments are not provided free of charge people might not seek medical help resulting in further spread of the disease. This is how it should work. If are sick with Covid-19 and infect someone else they will sue you. And if you will not pay the damages rightfully owed to the person you injured you will go to jail. That should be plenty of incentive for people to quarantine and seek treatment for Covid-19.
How did I do? Ready for Fox News?
10
@DRK Nice! You had me going.
1
We have to stop making this political our enemies are counting on the fact that we are a divided nation to bring us down
The problem is that we are fighting this brand new virus the way we fought prior ones. This virus has odd almost unique characteristics and very little is known about it. But what is known is that it is extremely contagious, and once you have it it’s hard to get rid of, some people appeared to have caught it again after recovering but this is not for sure , we can only deal with what is known about it.
The key is not to catch it, somebody with symptoms will have a cough and a fever , since people seem to have no problem leaving their house and going out and about with a cough then it up to you to avoid people with coughs.
In people who are asymptotic the virus will be transferred very much like AIDS or Herpes, through kissing , through sex or using the same needles
At the very least the virus should not be taken lightly . Let’s pray we have the right leadership to protect us. Both in the federal government and local levels.
Take the proper steps, be smart , a virus like this is the ultimate example of Darwinism in action . The smarter you are the better your chances
@Lonnie
I'm going to let you into a secret. The biggest and scariest of the USA's enemies are yourselves.
3
If possible, NEVER take a ride in an ambulance.
6
Any bill I suppose is for the evacuation from the Chinese hot zone. They could have stayed or possibly moved to another location in China?.
What should be though is transparency in cost. What is cost for the trip? The quarentine I'd think would be heavily subsidized as it was more to protect the public than anything else. The only cost should be food and a checkup.
Medicare for All proposals are being waived like a magic wand to high medical costs. Where are the details on how this would actually work?
4
@Craig
How would Medicare for All actually work?
How about asking all those First World Countries who have enjoyed it for decades!
Common America--you, the only one without it, can do it too!--the Best Country in the World, after all!
2
@Craig the USA spends two to three times the cost per person of every civilised country for its healthcare. Governments job is to mandate lower costs. End.
1
It seems to me that if you are quarantined by the government and not allowed to leave, then in effect it is the same as being a prisoner in a jail. In those cases, the government should pay for whatever costs are incurred. If on the other hand, it is only suggested that you remain quarantined and can leave if you want to, but choose to stay, I would say the charges are then yours to pay. People can be quarantined at home and incur no cost. I would say the same is true for people who are hospitalized and kept there against their will. Then costs should be covered by the hospital and the government jointly. Any time a citizen is detained for any reason and refused the right to leave they should not be expected to pay for any costs.
17
@Ms. Pea I would guess that rational thinking would not prevail.
2
@Ms. Pea "Rational" "thinking" and "Republican" don't sit in the same universe let alone the same table.
2
One wonders what steps were taken by the ambulance company to keep the next vulnerable passenger from being infected? Even medical professionals seem to be engaged in behavior that seems ill thought out for a virus this contagious.
15
@William i was wondering if extra measures to prevent personnel contamination and then thorough vehicle disinfection contributed to what appears to be a ery high ambulance bill (without addressing who the responsible party should be)
1
If people don't have health insurance or paid sick leave, they will work and be out and about. This spreads flu as well. There are many deaths, each year, from the flu. I hope the tide will turn and we will finally get Medicare for All and require sick days for all workers.
25
@Carmen if people don’t have transportation, mobile phones, clothes, food and a house they will become restless and inflict pain on society. To avoid that the government should provide those free too? Is there any point in an individual’s life where they have to take ownership in their decisions or is the nanny state just going to provide everything?
2
@Bert you are missing the point completely! In order to contain the virus we need people to stay at home once community transmission appears. It keeps everyone safer- even you! If you think you will lose your job or not be able to pay your bills- staying home becomes impossible.
4
The government is allowed to mandate something and force you to pay for it. For example, in California, we are required to have health insurance or we have to pay a fine on our state income tax. This was ruled legal and California residents gave no choice.
3
@mileena Because many without insurance seek treatment at emergency rooms which are legally mandated to treat them.
Quite often such folks can't or won't pay the bill for treatment that they sought. What happens? The hospital increases what they charge other patients to make up the shortfall.
There ain't no free lunch.
12
@mileena
People use the Emergency Room when they should go to a clinic. The teaching hospitals in California often bear the brunt of this population overload. These hospitals are tax payer supported. The cost for an ER room visit is massively higher than a clinic visit. That is part of the driving force for the California policy.
If you are low income in California you can get insurance thru a state program. If you don’t then you need to buy insurance or pay the tax. If you are complaining about the tax then wake up and start urging your Federal government to present a low cost public alternative or Medicare for all.
5
@mileena yup, I'm forced to pay for your police, who harass people like me. I pay for your military, while they do nothing to protect me. I pay for your roads, while there are few maintained sidewalks that I walk on...
2
The reasons and the need for Medicare for all is obvious. My only question is, can incompetent republican politicians keep their grimy hands off of it if it is ever somehow enacted.
15
@Robert O. It's not incompetence. Any GOP monkeywrencing will be for the sole purpose of ensuring private profit off of the system.
2
"Mr. Wucinski, a Pennsylvania native who has lived in China for years, accepted the U.S. government’s offer to evacuate from Wuhan with Annabel in early February as the new coronavirus spread."
I think there's more going on with Mr. Wucinski than being told; the guy cuts and runs from his wife. And for him to say his daughter, "isn't a great conversationalist," is despicable.
Something about that guy doesn't seem on the up and up..
7
@Aaron I love my husband, but he and I both agree that our son comes first. If we were in that guy’s shoes —where we had to choose between staying in the middle of an epidemic and quarantine for moral support, or leaving for a place with almost no outbreak— we’d air kiss and wave each other goodbye with no doubt in our minds that it was the best choice for our kid. It doesn’t come from a lack of spousal love, but an understanding that our kid comes first.
14
@Aaron Toddlers are NOT great conversationalists and the guy is a normal human being - not the least bit "despicable".
2
Cut and run? You’re making it out like the guy sent his wife to the supermarket and ran off with the kid. I assume the child’s mother, concerned for her daughter’s life, was part of making a really difficult family decision.
Secondly, you should look up the definition of despicable. I think you may be confusing it with sarcastic.
3
“I should take her to the doctor this week for a checkup, but we don’t have insurance, so it’s just going to have to be cash,” he said.
Through the state’s Obamacare exchange website, they could be covered immediately regardless of any preexisting condition.
6
@David Fergenson
"Through the state’s Obamacare exchange website, they could be covered immediately regardless of any preexisting condition."
Yes, technically, they could. But since they would not have met their deductible, that "coverage" would not lower their ~$4000 medical bills by a single cent. PLUS they'd have to fork over $1600 a month in insurance premiums.
9
I don’t live in Pennsylvania but these numbers are nothing like those on my local exchange. I plugged in reasonable numbers for their situation and the monthly cost is $457.66 for a platinum plan.
2
@David Fergenson e al: if we don't know how PA's system works, we shouldn't paint the picture. In NY there are a vast array of plans, with great ranges of deductibles ad copays. California sounds generous, but it is on the gentleman to research what's available in PA, or if he's eligible for Medicaid.
1
Lol, the hospital bill is scarier than getting coronavirus...
17
From the start , 2 months now, I have been writing in the comment section of this newspaper what could be done to prevent this pandemic from growing , it could have been stamped out easily with some common sense practices and strong leadership
I will try again :
If you are sick with a cough you stay home , all US employers will give paid sick days to an employee with a cough or fever . This will stop a pandemic from spreading more than anything
Child has a cough they stay home from school , in fact they stay home period, one working parent can stay home with them... they get paid
Anybody coming from any region of the world where Corona is spreading if the fly back to US 2 week quarantine
Are you telling me we can’t develop a mask that keeps virus out, we sent a man to the moon - where are the masks
If one mask is shown to be effective it should be massed produced by factories in the United States working around the clock, the police, EMS , Hospital workers get them first than the general public
Rush through a vaccine work around the clock
People who are sick still have to shop advertise all kinds of ways they can get food delivered to their homes
Seriously, there are so many proactive steps we could take that would both stop this virus from spreading and at the same time lift spirits
Right now nothing is being done that’s significant
I will keep writing ... one day someone will listen
Because unless we fight now this is going to get much, much worse
12
@Lonnie
The mask is often not effective due to hand-face contact. Effective protection is self awareness and may or may not involve a mask. Hand washing is most important and avoid hand-face contact.
6
@Lonnie Many people do not have paid sick leave, or do not have enough to cover 14 days plus. Do you think McDonald's employees making minimum wage get sick lleave?
12
The mask could help if you are contagious, y’know prevent others from becoming infected.
Once the public finds out it will be charged for quarantine, X-ray readings, and ambulance rides you'll find many thousands will just go home and take two aspirins.
And you can thank the naked greed of our health care system for the spread of the coronavirus if this comes to pass.
46
@Don Siracusa Necessaties like health care and housing being up to the whims of profiteers is a pox on this country that is slowly destroying us
4
@Greg Bulls eye Greg, thank you
Can't pay these medical bills but sure can pay 135 million forr Trumps golf fees and hundreds of thousands for trump Jr.to fly to Asia for business deals. $250,000 an hour for Trump to fly to his political rallies. Yes, folks we are in big debt, need to cut back.
44
@Richard Head Nice to remember how
Obama never spent a single penny on
trips abroad or played golf. Not 1 ¢
1
Without an effective vaccine, the only way to reduce the spread of this or any virus is containment. However, most people cannot afford to isolate and not to go to work, and few can afford the incredible medical bills that are a result or urgent or emergency care. All I can do to prepare is to wash my hands constantly and try to maintain a 6 foot distance from other people.
12
@Wernda or anyone; Will short term disability pay when absence from work is due to quarantine without diagnosis?
1
The article states that the US government offered to evacuate this guy, and he accepted the offer. The evacuation was optional. Benefit of the bargain. You didn’t have to come. You could have stayed and been treated in China. Now you pay. Or am I missing something here?
3
@B. Bailey He wasn't "treated", he was held in quarantine, not for his sake but for our sake.
Yes, you missed a lot.
10
@B. Bailey Yes, you are.
1
@B. Bailey Yes, you are missing compassion.
2
medicare for all seems like the simplest solution to a classic American scandal.
16
it looks surreal for such a rich and developped country as USA not to have any healthcare system available and affordable for every citizen.
1
This is the system that is, in your dreams, is Making America Great Again! Come on and get real, Americans. So you want to keep that lovely health insurance with its unaffordable deductibles and monthly payments that keep going up? The American electorate needs to go on life support, then maybe they will see the advantage of a candidate that actually cares for their needs and who does not take PAC money from Pharma or Insurance companies.
13
Why does this man's employer provide health insurance for their employee while in China, but not when he is home in the United States? What is that all about?
8
@Jay different insurance. Are there policies that would cover both here & in China? And if there are such how much do they cost?
I think this is, in fact, standard. Those who spend substantial time in more than one country either need gold=plated insurance that covers everywhere or more than one policy. One can buy a short term policy for a particular trip or for a year.
It seems that this guy was living in China so he didn't know he needed American insurance.
8
@Jay maybe it was a chinese company, not an American one?
The person in the article has been living in China for 15 years. It’s likely the company he works for is based in China. Does your health insurance cover you when you’re traveling? Probably not.
1
This is the stark reality of the totally inferior medical coverage people receive or don't receive in this supposedly exceptional country. The situation here is completely unacceptable and that has become a stark reality in the face of this epidemic. Although I don't support Sanders, I think he's right about universal medical coverage. We could certainly afford it if our priorities were correct. In other words: we don't have to waste billions on useless vanity projects like the Wall or paying for trump's golf vacations. The most important priority should be the health of the citizens, and unless all are covered, we're all threatened.
22
I feel sad and concern about your health insurance. I've read in these comments about people unable to get proper diabetic treatment. I've got a spare glucometer ( Accucheck) with the full kit ( autopick and glucosticks) I 'd like to send it to someone in need. Let me know how to proceed
They were "nice" until you got the bill.
Yesterday in an attempt to find out the recent toxicity levels in Suffolk County Long Island drinking water I explained my call to Lee Zeldin's office in Patchouge was my fourth inquiry without response this year to find out if tap water was safe to drink as levels of 1-4 dioxane have been discovered. The legislative assistant upon hearing my contention called me "nasty" and hung up the phone.
Nasty or nice is for Santa. You better watch out.
5
@Guy Walker Well it's not my old district but come on! You guys elected a Republican!? What did you expect?
Get it together!
1
@Guy Walker if you're really interested in this info, zeldin's the wrong guy to call. he's a fed legislator, not local. (an appalling situation on its own, but off topic) contact the locals: village, town, county & state. know who your water provide is before you contact the relevant DECs.
Of COURSE the government should pay. The government mandated the hospitalizations, the government should pay.
16
Welcome to the United States of America where American style capitalism rules the day.
Even if we survive Trump, it’s doubtful that any Republican legislator will work with Dems to begin the process to change our health care system to serve the people & not the profiteers.
Belgium, France, Switzerland, Japan & many other civilized modern countries have both private/public health care system configurations available to ALL of their citizens. These systems provide MODERN medicine & care to the people. There is only 1 reason why America does not consider joining modernity & that is to preserve the current For Profit Model. The United States is supposedly the most exceptional country on the face of the earth; maybe true for a short time during the 20th century but not anymore. Thank the Republicans & the profiteers for that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_systems_by_country
20
American exceptionalism. In the case of medical coverage for its citizens, exceptionally bad.
You are the best at getting to the moon, development of digital technology, blues, rock roll, rap, showbiz, movies and much more.
But lets face it- exceptionally inept at medical coverage for your populace. You are the best at many things- but not everything.
18
Hopefully a journalist asks Trump about these bills at his next news conference. And the impact of the uninsured/underinsured on the spread of the disease. And what he thinks now about defunding infectious disease programs. And about his super duper health insurance plan. And Pence’s past health positions. Be more than stenographers.
17
@David Appell "You can keep your doctor"
1
@David Appell Next news conference? You might be waiting a while...
Lots of people are going to get this virus. Lots of them won't know because they're afraid a visit to the hospital will bankrupt them.
20
Exactly.
How do we continue to hide from the inconvenient truth that Bernie Sanders is the only candidate who will constructively advocate for the medically disadvantaged via MediCare for all ?
13
Depending on how serious the pandemic becomes will determine if the trumpster introdures a national health care plan by executive order!! I know this sounds completely absurd but watch him go for it if the economy craters and we have many hospitalized. Plus large ventilator farms which haven't even been put together. I already read about experts putting forth four possible stimulous packages he could try, this being one of them. Deviously brilliant because that's the Democratic issue that he then steals. Don't necessarily bet against this happening..
4
China should pay reparations to the rest of the world. Their careless and unsanitary practices in fresh animal markets has caused this whole mess. They should pay for the clean up, including this guy's medical bills.
As far as universal healthcare goes, this guy would pay the costs on the front end through a bill, or on the back end, by having much more of his paycheck go toward a universal plan. What's the difference? People who call for universal health care are clueless as to the actual societal costs of that type of program.
4
@susan m Should we pay reparations for invading Iraq & destabilizing the Middle East? Or do you think our invasion worked out well?
As for the "societal costs" of universal care, nations that have such a system spend something like half of what we spend per person on healthcare so what the hey are you talking about?
You could check it out for yourself. I assume you have a computer. Google how much various nations spend as a percentage of their GDP. You might learn something.
BTW do you hate Social Security & Medicare?
1
Fox news, started by Australian conservative firebrand rupert murdoch, has been running an interview featuring Mr Wucinski.
The video is obviously edited, shows Mr Wucinski clearing his throat several times.
Mr murdochs disciples makes no mention of erratic hospital billing procedures, and unfair charges.
Often, these health care providers go into collection before they acknowedge their own mistakes.
Heath cares predatory practices, backed by a president who sees only profit, along with media sources such as fox are more frightening than covid-19.
2
I am not sure how mandatory quarantine differs from the individual mandate under the Affordable Care Act. Didn't Republicans in Congress eliminate the individual mandate in its tax cut legislation?
1
@Robert No, California still requires you to have health insurance or pay a fine on your state income tax.
1
To fight this virus, the government simply has to pick up the tab. Otherwise many people will tough it out and not go to the doctor when they suspect they are ill.
The government also needs to assure people that someone will pay for their sick days, and when they come back to work, that their job will still be there. Otherwise people who are living paycheck-to-paycheck won't self-quarantine because they can't afford it.
And then, what happens to people who are sharing living space? It's a sure thing that they'll contaminate their housemates.
It would be beyond ironic if this virus forces America to become more socialist, at least for the duration of this epidemic. And they'd better do it quickly; there's no time to waste.
8
@mlbex God forbid that the USA becomes more socialist by sharing the cost of a disaster.
From the Independent, but also all over the news:
Alex Azar, Donald Trump's health secretary, has told politicians he cannot guarantee that a coronavirus vaccine will be affordable to everyone once it has been developed.
[ ] Mr Azar said: "We would want to ensure that we work to make it affordable, but we can't control that price, because we need the private sector to invest. Price controls won't get us there."
So, folks, if you want to actually get vaccinated once that becomes possible, considering talking a medical vacation to.... um... any other country.
17
Before the COVID19 virus struck, I’ve wondered about this each time we endured a mass shooting.....how many were/are uninsured? My beloved state boasts another shooting earlier this week in Milwaukee.
Presumably these shooting victims would require ambulances, surgery, hospital stays, IV meds, physical therapy, trauma counseling, etc all because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, then face huge hospital bills? One might miss a lot of work in recovery making payments impossible.
I want to say to Candidate Pete and other ‘moderate dems’ YES, my household would be willing to give up our A insurance coverage through my job with the state so the US could finally launch Single Payer Healthcare for All.
17
When this thing started my wife and I talked about two things that will remain to be seen as this shakes out. 1) Who will pay for all the quarantines and tests, etc?, and 2) What is going on in North Korea? I fear that poor, uninsured, underinsured, high deductable Americans will avoid detection as it becomes clearer that the full weight of the cost of this will fall on the individual, and once news gets out from NK we will likely see the extent of the catastrophe in a country in isolated poverty.
7
Gotta agree.
Well, this is definitely going to prove Bernie's position for Medicare for all. Couldn't have created a better argument if you tried.
7
Mr. Wucinski has my sympathy. Certainly his bills should be covered by the US government. When such costs are forgiven by providers, those costs are passed along to other local medical consumers and to local government. California has received the greatest number of evacuees, and when they could not be accommodated on military bases they were dumped on local hospitals. (To make matters worse, it appears that quarantine protocols weren’t followed.) When the US government chooses to provide massive evacuation and mandatory quarantine it must be the guarantor of costs incurred. This looks like another Trump stick-it-to California deal.
5
If the government holds people against their will the government must pay. If i am not free to walk out the door whenever i want then i am not responsible financially. The reasoning is very simple, in a free society the government can not keep you captive and expect you to pay the bill. Are we a free country or not?
9
There's no better way to spread the COVID virus throughout the U. S. than to make people without health insurance or with inadequate health insurance liable for the huge medical bills that could be incurred by getting treated for this illness. Would the well-to-do act against their own self interests by favoring a broken health care system that would endanger themselves?
If our insane health system remains intact, those unable to pay for medical treatment will likely keep moving around in their communities, thereby spreading COVID quickly into all the nooks and crannies of our society.
If there was ever a time to clearly demonstrate that single-payer health insurance is the only logical and sane policy to have, now is the time. It is time that capitalist health insurance companies, who are like leeches feeding off of the sick for their own financial benefit, be seen for what they are. The companies' interest is a self- interest, and not a public and compassionate interest, and it's time to see their true nature in the light of this rapidly approaching epidemic.
13
I wish I were surprised by this article, but I’m sure none of us are ... there are a few making tons of money from this (lack of) “system” and the rest of us pay through the nose for basic healthcare.
I am a survivor of breast cancer and anytime I am sent for a test or scan I always end up with bills well over $1000 (that is with “good” insurance). It is getting to the point where I feel I should just skip the test...
Something has got to give ...
19
Remember: we give billions in bailouts to wall street banks, and restructured their entire industry after 2008. So we can *definitely* bail out pandemic victims and restructure the medical economy - if we have the humanity to do so.
12
Given we live in country facing a pandemic, where 30 million people live without access to health care services, we're probably about to "learn more" about the advantages of an insurance company run health care system. At least somebody's making money off it.
5
My advice: just rip of the bills. If it were me, I would love to see them in court if they tried to sue me.
6
@Duke and everyone should wear a hazmat suit to their court appearances. scare the bejesus out of 'em.
I am tired of people here saying this was mandated by the government. It was not. These people chose to be evacuated on a charter flight to the US, knowing they would be quarantined. As such, they need to pay for these services. Most of these people are wealthy retirees anyway ,with Medicare and possibly Medigap, so they can afford it.
Let's be clear: Private ambulance companies are the predatory check-cashing businesses of the medical-industrial complex. There is absolutely NO WAY a ride to a hospital for two symptom-free individuals is worth $2600, unless they were driven from California to New York, meals and overnight lodging included.
What are you going to do about this, Representatives and Senators?
14
So, at last is revealed of Trump's campaign promise, from 2016, of "way better care". So, as we can see four years later, Trump care is the equivalent of the Emperor's new clothes, no care at all. The potentially emerging health crisis could bankrupt millions of Americans, and turn the economy upside down.
13
Last week US stock markets lost 3 trillion dollars because of the fear of a pandemic. Universal health care would reduce that fear for a tiny fraction of the cost and the country would be better off for it for everyone.
17
while not related to coronavirus, getting a surprised health care or hospital bill is an experience that has led me to support universal healthcare. until that happens, i call and check everywhere to make sure what going to the doctor, getting a study, or medication will cost which is a frustrating time consuming process. then i pray that i don’t end up in the hospital involuntarily.
14
Are vast majority of Americans, not just some, including those living away from the liberal coastal areas, ready to be like Europeans and cough up 50 percent plus of annual income (in Norway, it’s close to 70 percent) to gain benefits of health insurance coverage for all? Sounds good in theory but I have my misgivings.
1
@Julia Yes, but they don't pay health insurance premiums, co-pays and other out-of-pocket expenses that destroy family budgets and lead to homelessness. Kind of balances out.
15
@Julia Yes, people in European countries may pay more in taxes, but it's not just for health care. They get affordable, quality education, child care for working parents, and sound infrastructure, AND their health care outcomes--things like maternal and infant mortality and life expectancy--are substantially better than ours, at about half the cost. You need to stop focusing on taxes and look instead at total cost to you. One dollar in taxes for universal health coverage vs. two dollars for premiums, copays and deductibles is a smart tradeoff.
28
@Julia B No they pay more like 50% above a certain income. By the time we pay federal state and local and sales we are way above 50%. Our corporations pay a small amount. Used to pay 35% of fed taxes now pay 12% Tax rate in 1980 was 50% and we did nor have debt. Tax rates so low now we have A trillion dollar year debt.
Figure that most are paying $12,000 a year and add that to the pay for single payer and we see that taxes will be way below that. By the way the government now pays 64% of our health care bills,
11
We should reconsider the rhetoric in this ongoing debate.
"The government" isn't forcing people to shoulder exorbitant medical bills. We, the People, voted our way into the problem and have allowed it to fester.
Thus far, the American people as a whole have favored 'low/no tax' ideologues over leaders who are willing to tackle our broken healthcare system. It's time we start shining a brighter light on our collective responsibility during any healthcare debate.
25
Everyone should refuse from now on to pay ANY hospital bills that are not covered entirely by their insurance. No more "out of network" bills, i.e., not covered by insurance either because of coverage limits or because some out-of-network doctor like an anesthesiologist or some lab unaffiliated with-- NONE of these providers should be paid one dime. Then let them turn our bills over to credit agencies. Then stiff them. And when the whole system comes crashing down we can start to rebuild American health insurance on the remnants of the hospitals, doctors' corporations and labs we've put out of business.
14
Not paying them means a dent in your financial record, which will prevent you from later financing a car or a home, or even getting a lower interest credit card.
It also means the taxpayers will foot the bill of the astronomical prices.
Neither is a solution. There’s a need to rein in exorbitant medical bills. There’s a need for a government option health insurance. And in the case of government mandated quarantine, Congress must pass a law where patients should not be responsible for ANY cost associated with the quarantine AND pay for lost wages and other compensations.
It’s not just medical bills that will make people avoid seeking help, it’s those living paycheck by paycheck, hourly workers who don’t get paid if they don’t show up to work. How about those?
2
Mr. Wucinski should find out if his daughter is covered under Medicaid or Commonwealth of PA "CHIP" coverage for children. There may be public options for him and his daughter. It's tough to navigate the government agencies and determine coverage and even tougher to submit claims. But, it's worth the effort. I think he'll be pleasantly surprised.
Frankly I would seek relief at every level for every bill since this is government imposed medical care. Ask for relief from everyone who sent a bill.
As a retired senior who lived in Harrisburg PA for 55 years I know how devastating these medical bills are. I also know that if you dig deeply enough (and it's tough work) you can find assistance. Knock on every door and leave no stone unturned.
Persevere! Best wishes. JF
6
Why should anyone work so hard for a human right? which is what healthcare is.
3
Send the bills to Mike Pence at the White House. He can pray the balance away.
@Robert Romano because in the meantime, we have to deal with what is, not what we wish it to be.
I've worked since I was thirteen. That's fifty years. Recently I've had to be hospitalized a number of times for a chronic condition. I have a combination of medicare and health insurance. I have been billed a copay that amounts to over ten thousand dollars. The bills keep arriving, the doctors keep talking about trial and error, I'm learning about being in groups and not being in groups. I'm not cured but I'm lucky. The undiscounted bill is over 100 thousand. If I didn't have insurance I'd be broke.
When I have an issue with my car I bring it in and trust my mechanic will fix it, but it's only a car. Trial and error isn't so important or expensive. With our healthcare system, we spend a great deal of money and don't know what we're doing. It's broke. Medicare for All? Affordable Care Act? Don't be afraid. Like a very stable genius said,"What do we have to lose?"
19
@Ken -Wow. I health care insurance 'system is a joke. Until you have to use it. Then it's a nightmare.
1
This administration is fine with spending many billions on a wall that has yet to be built, but has a history of shirking when it comes to aiding and protecting people--Americans--before, during, and after major disasters. November is time for a good housecleaning.
32
@bluewhinge Obama administration was fine
spending billions on undocumented aliens.
1
Excellent reason to enact Medicare For All.
Mandated quarantines including transport, testing, treatment, meals and accommodation should be paid by the government.
To do otherwise undercuts public compliance with mandated quarantines and jeopardizes public health.
51
We are in a state of emergency, and there is a significant probability that this sickness will develop worldwide, including in the US, especially if we do not get organized properly. In the US nobody should refrain to approach a doctor, a hospital...if he or she believes that something is wrong. Such action could help in limiting the development of this virus....and thus, it should highlighted asap by the President, himself, that the costs related to this approach, as well as the treatments related to that virus should be free of charge. National emergency requires to act aggressively, including on sharing the financial burden via specific measures : those costs should be borne by the ones who can support them (ie: for sure, not the poor and the middle class)
27
Recently, my doctor decided that I needed a lumbar puncture to have certain diagnostic tests. I am considered fortunate to have very good employment based health insurance. First, I spent hours on the phone finding an in-network surgeon. Next more time making sure the hospital was in-network. Then still more time finding an in-network anesthesiologist and laboratory to do the tests. After all that, my insurance company decided - contrary to all the doctors who treated me - that the procedure would not be medically necessary and thus would not be covered. Appeals requiring still more time and effort followed. Finally, after more than a month of stressful work, the procedure and tests were approved. Medicare-for-All is sounding very appealing to me these days.
88
This is exactly the process and gigantic time waste that occurred when I tore my ACL including fighting over whether it was medically necessary.
8
@Charles L. Don't believe Medicare will
automatically approve everything, either.
@J B Perhaps not, but it will not have a profit-making motive to deny care.
1
US healthcare is totally broken. If all the costs related to novel coronavirus aren’t paid by the government, how does it expect people to take tests or stay at hospital in isolation? Instead of building walls, like China, we should be building hospitals in two weeks. What about making Mar-a-Lago into a hospital for isolation and treatment for coronavirus patients? I wouldn’t have any problem with $600/night stays paid by tax payer money in that case.
38
"We didn't have a choice." That is the key fact in this story and so many others about medical billing. It is not just the bills for testing and treatment for this virus; it's almost all medical bills. We didn't have a choice.
Even so, hospitals and other provider firms treat us as if we did. They don't just bill us for whatever they want to charge, they send us to collection if we don't pay, and then sue us.
Bankruptcy is just the tip of the iceberg of the harm we suffer. There's the harm of a ruined credit record that impairs our ability to get credit, housing, even employment. People who don't declare bankruptcy get sued, have their wages and their savings accounts garnished, driving them further into poverty. Here in Washington State, where the first person has died of the virus, hospitals can garnish 20% of wages, and only $420 per week to live is exempt. That's less than poverty for a family of four.
This virus highlights a ruinous system of medical billing where patients do not know what the bill will be, have no power to negotiate it, and no choice but to incur it.
47
Canadians or Britons would not have this issue. Universal Health Care is urgently needed in the US.
52
@Sajwert
Emergency care is always available, serious cases are seen quickly, and there are walk-in clinics in every city where you can see a doctor without an appointment. So yes, I may have to wait months to have my knee replaced, but if I have pneumonia, I won't wait long for care.
23
@Sajwert I (an American) had my first (and only) severe allergic reaction in London and was treated at the hospital right away, no charge. Perhaps there are wait times for specialists but that can often be the case in America too (unless it’s an emergency) , but with the added bonus of big copays and deductibles.
20
@Sajwert
I think your understanding is flawed, Sajwert. Access to primary care doctors in both countries is excellent, and as for emergency care - wait times that are considered scandalous in the UK, are standard in US ERs.
There can indeed be long waits to see a specialist, just like here in the US. Do people not realize that it also take months here to see specialists? With the added issue of the large percentages who will never see a specialist at all, due to their inability to afford to do so?
5
The coming crisis will shine an intense critical light on the inadequacies of the American private health care system. The conflict between the limitations of a health care system controlled by private insurance interests and the demands of that protection of the health of the public will become clear.
56
Many who have symptoms will choose not to be admitted or seek medical care being afraid of the medical costs involved. Containment will be even more difficult than in countries with universal health care.
85
Reading this over a coffee this morning just incenses me. Your Government forces you into quarantine but no one has sorted who will pay? Unbelievable. Very pleased to be living in New Zealand with healthcare covered for all. Just the cost of an average night in hospital in the States is mind blowing enough! Hope the US govt steps in and sorts out this situation in the quarantinees favour very soon.
96
@Matt -- This is par for the course in the US. Don't worry, after a while we get used to it. Sure, a bunch of us die every year because we don't have health insurance but that's the price of freedom, right? (do you consider yourself free enough to lose your house due to unexpected medical bills? we do!) Yay America!
10
@Matt (to your last sentence) you're quite the comedian!
1
It’s all going to be be paid for by the “great, great” health care plan by Trump and the Republicans, the “greatest plan probably ever”. You know, the plan that will never exist.
98
The medical industrial complex is a criminal enterprise. Americans are being ripped off at a time of maximum vulnerability.
Doesn’t happen elsewhere in the western world, only in America.
92
@Tullymd
Didn't President Cooledge once say that the business of America was business?
Medical care and medical insurance is a business pure and simple. And a business that can't make a lot of money is going to shrivel and die.
2
Evan you and your spouse both work, and have great insurance plans, you are still 2 jobs away from facing YUGE medical bills and possible bankruptcy. Germany/Canada/Australia/Japan/SoKo/Taiwan/Chile all have single payers and their hosptals are privately owned. There is one reason why many Americans don't want single payer, RACISM. If the colored minority have equal access, they will lose the feeling of superiority even they are poorly insured but better than the colored citizens.
25
@d great insight D - a truly a major factor, but never forget the hundreds of millions in PAC Super-PAC and other lobbying programs funded and On-Going by the members of the health Industry!! follow the MONEY !
3
@d Please explain.
@JT Lawlor , Money class spinned M4A/Single Payer as radical idea, and many Americans bought into it.....The current governments in UK/Germany/Australia are right of center, yet I never heard they complained their healthcare systems are radical ideas...Either Americans are brainwashed by propaganda, or we are not analytical enough. I am sure we are brainwashed by the idea of rugged individualism for all of us, socialism for the rich ( socialized losses, privatized profit )
Wake up, America! You’ve been had! Healthcare for all is not only achievable and affordable - we can’t afford NOT to have it.
67
@Philippe Egalité we absolutely cannot afford not to have it. Agreed. This is an issue of public safety.
10
@Philippe Egalité
Therein lies one of the strongest arguments for universal medical coverage, including undocumented people. Everybody is at risk for contracting and passing on disease. Denial of (paid) medical care exposes the entire community to disease.
I'm interested in seeing what happens when there is an outbreak at an internment facility, where even regular medical care is substandard.
4
It’s the ambulance fees that are early covered. Take an Uber
7
@Mary M many ambulance services have been bought by private for-profit companies, up to 85%, and they bill exorbitant rates that insurance and even Medicare will not cover. Then the companies dun the patients for the balance, and are aggressive about it. Another failing of our system in allowing healthcare costs to be driven by private enterprises.
36
@Mary M Uber driver might not love getting covid19 infected riders.
1
@Mary M
Take an Uber when you are sick? Really? So you cough in the car and the driver as well as the next several people who take that Uber car get infected without knowing it and pass it along to their family or co-workers. Yup. Just take an Uber to the hospital when you're sick. Great idea.
1
Our health care system is exactly what is going to help this virus spread throughout the US
66
Surprise billing is low hanging fruit. Maybe C-19 will take the whole rotten tree of the US health care system.
28
I had a minor dog bite last year of which I used steri strips to close the wound edges. This actually worked very well. The next day I foolishly sought care in an ER just to make sure it was ok. Upon arrival I was handed a syringe filled with normal saline and some 2x2 gauze and was instructed to soak the steri strips off so the MD could look at the wound. Anyhow, a physician’s assistant came over once I was done, looked at it for about 30 seconds and told the nurse to give me a tetanus shot and told me I could leave. Suffice to say when I got over $1000 in bills for this I was shocked. Truly, the American health care system is broken to the core.
79
@Griffin, I was randomly bitten by a dog in Amsterdam years ago. Not knowing if they had rabies there or not I went to a night clinic and got the same tetenus booster and a bill for the equivalent of $3.50.
The attendent then said: "Don't bother paying, it's not worth the paperwork."
15
In a country in which you can go bankrupt because of hospital bills incurred from being the victim of a mass shooting, how can I say, I'm not surprised.
87
Mr Bloomberg, here’s an ideal opportunity its to drain the swamp and drag out the ugly creature in it. The creature hates public healthcare and hates Obamacare, because the insurance industry and the drug industry pay Trump and his GOP leeches big money. I wonder why the number of flu deaths is so high? Could it perchance be because Americans without insurance cant afford healthcare so don’t go to a doctor when they get the flu. Then before you know it they have pneumonia. And die. The same will happen with the Coronavirus. The majority are dying from pneumonia and other lung conditions. And thousands will die this year because half of Americans have no private insurance and Americans will have no public healthcare if Obamacare is dismantled, as Trump and his cronies want. As we speak, they are in the courts getting red of it. Mr. Bloomberg, please run this commercial a thousand times. And don’t forget to feature Trump lying he will protect pre-existing conditions...next to a shot of his lawyers going into the court.
35
China built two hospitals in Wuhan in 10 days. The US cannot do that.
18
@Gregory Hayes Couldn't staff them if they did.
6
@Gregory Hayes you mean the makeshift shelters with cots lined up one foot apart from each other? the sinks and toilets are a short walk outside, probably squat pots with no water to wash your hands.
Medicare for All , anyone?
31
I am so grateful to live in Canada where this type of thing doesn't happen. Come on America...join the rest of the world and let everyone have healthcare.
44
Why do so many Canadians go the US for treatment?
1
@Mark nonsense.
@Mark and canadian nurses coming across the border to work since in Canada nurses make peanuts.
This is as bizarre as being sentenced by the judge to 10 years in prison for a bank robbery and then being billed by the judge for 'services rendered.'
13
@boji3 Yeah, that happens too and people who have served their time can't vote until they pay off fees and for their free "hotel stays."
3
And if we know one thing about Trump - he'll make everybody pay or go under trying.
Americans will be so fearful of missing work and spending money at ERs they won't come forward for treatment.
Trump's presser today was another joke. And even Dr. Faucci joined in the Sycophantic Dance With The Devil, praising him. Pence was beyond sickening. Is there a vaccine for what he's contracted from Trump because it's a very bad virus.
We are so unprepared. So unprepared it's shameful. Trump's incompetence is killing people as I write this. And so are the sycophants.
30
America, the Land of Greed. Isn't it a wonderful thing.
24
The patient was forced to take the treatment they had no choice in the matter thus they have no responsibility for the costs. That liability lay with the authority who used the force to hold them.
25
@magicisnotreal
exactly.
And the major pint of the quarantine and all related tests, are for the health and welfare of the community at large, which implies overarching reasons why the government should bear the costs. I have no objection to actual medical care being billed to insurers, for those with insurance. But this is care that will not be accepted as a medical expense in most cases.
1
@magicisnotreal
That is the way it should be, but is not legally correct.
1
@magicisnotreal
BTW back when contagion was common most folks had the common sense to follow sanitary procedures and quarantine was done in your home.
1
Testing should be performed at no cost to individuals - copays waived, and bills paid in full for people who are uninsured, with all of us, via the government, footing the bill. Tests should be widely available, also, and all people hospitalized currently for respiratory illnesses should be tested immediately. This is a no-brainer, but unfortunately the current administration operates below that particular bar.
36
For all those who are calling for medical coverage for all, could you give up the luxuries of the current system which you have been afforded? We have a very consumer-drive medical system that has been in place for decades, which means unnecessary costs are incurred to please and reassure the worried well in addition to caring for people appropriately. Patients are getting more and more pushy on seeking and demanding tests. Many other countries who provide the well needed universal coverage you seek would not allow their patients to demand the order of unnecessary tests like they are ordering food off a menu. “Doctor, I want these three types of thyroid blood tests I read about online... Lyme disease testing for my fatigue... spine MRIs for straightforward back pain, a dermatologist only to help me with my mild acne, etc.” I fully support health coverage as a basic right, but such a system can not afford for us to carry the bloated demands of our current one.
16
Doctors want to protect themselves from liability and frivolous lawsuits by ordering a barrage of tests is another factor that adds costs for all. It's the system.
15
Guaranteeing basic health coverage for all does not preclude the rich from paying for premium coverage. You can have your cake and eat it too. There should be universal coverage. Then let the market dictate costs for additional services.
26
@Dr. C "could you give up the luxuries of the current system which you have been afforded?" I would in a heartbeat. No more unnecessary tests, mri's, cat scans, cesareans, etc. Our medical industry, and make no mistake, it has been morphed into an industry, with doctors' quotas and performance requirements which have turned our healthcare system into an assembly line which rewards volume and revenue generation.
We pay by far the most in the world per capita for healthcare and the last time I saw the stats were 14th in healthcare outcomes. That is not acceptable! They say we have the best healthcare in the world, yeah maybe for those Saudi oil billionaires with solid gold bathrooms in their private 747's they use to come here to get that great healthcare not your average American.
11
If ever there was an argument for Healthcare For All, this is it.
46
So this is a vivid example why some Progressives sometimes go directly to question the morality/motivations of everybody who is not a progressive and stands as an obstacle in the way of progress. See: centrists politicians pandering to (let’s be realistic) affluent and/or middle class coverage wringing their hands about “being left behind” when fear-mongering about losing their presumably functional health coverage (or their lack of an issue for ignorant luck from not having to deal with insurance YET) and being taken too far to the left to change the status quo. I think a lot of progressives are rightfully disgusted by such a willfully ignorant/selfish/unjust/fake-victimized worldview — you see, the people who face financial ruin or health tragedy are the ones who are actually left behind in the depravity-ridden dystopia that has let you well off to be pandered about not wanting to change it.
12
And think about his ability to Petition to bring his wife to the U.S. if he accepts the payment of the medical bills or public benefits he would disqualify himself from being able to bring his wife to the US. How will that be for his daughter?
8
Welcome home Mr. Wucinski, this is how American medicine works. My biggest fear is not getting sick but dealing with the Bureaucracy/bills that are connected with it. I am on Medicare however I cant afford a supplement plan so I have a advantage plan and have to deal with the network issue. If you have a medical emergency out of network doctors are paid however I wonder if they consider a mandatory quarantine an emergency?
15
Also keep in mind that the Trump administration testified to Congress saying that if any vaccine is developed, the cost will be set by private sector - so profits will limit access. Of course, like insulin, there will be price gouging.
This is insane from a public health standpoint, as well as deeply immoral.
43
@Bill Wolfe Say tis again Bill --
Unethical and IMMORAL !!! but it is the American Way !
This is a great and timely example of what a joke healthcare is in the US.
I have been wondering for several weeks now what might happen to someone without adequate health insurance in the US who gets ill and is required to be tested, is found to have the COVIR19 virus, gets treatment, has to be quarantined, hospitalized, put on a respirator etc.
Surely the US Government has already thought of this? You know, to help keep this from spreading to other people?
Oh, my God. Trump has put Pence in charge of this? You're kidding!
30
When Wall Street got "sick" in 2008, it was bailed out by the government with more than 800 billion dollars. To save the banking system and economy, government paid financial healthcare was rationalized to the public as necessary for the benefit of all Americans.
Now when a virus threatens the physical health and well being of all Americans, individuals like Mr. Wucinski will be expected to foot the bill alone and many people will die as a result.
It should now be obvious to all that the disgraceful absence of universal healthcare is a threat to the health and to the very lives all Americans.
Republicans en masse from the President, Senators, US House members, down to municipal officials should be voted out of office.
Our lives depend upon it.
50
@David Republicans should be voted out for many, many reasons. Sadly, though, it was a Democratic administration that handed over 800 billion dollars of taxpayer dollars to Wall Street and it was a Democratic administration that came up with the indefensible, profit-driven situation we now have to deal with.
3
I have insurance (which I pay for) and still don't go to the doctor because my insurance company is unable to tell me what a routine visit will cost before I go and my doctor can't know what my insurance will and will not cover.
Given this story you can be pretty sure most Americans won't follow government suggestions or mandates for fear of unknown medical bills making any control or containment efforrs a farse.
52
Sadly, my first thought was, “that’s cheap.” A friend just had same-day, outpatient rotator cuff surgery in Pittsburgh (out by 5pm) and the hospital bill was $65,000, with another $7500 bill from the doctor. Who pays? We all pay. Health care costs are out of hand.
39
No one forced into containment for the benefit of other people should have to pay. The purported beneficiaries should pay. And of couse one knows who they are.
19
We are going to soon find the true cost of NOT having a national health service and of HAVING a large uninsured population, who will not go to seek medical help...until it's too late.
36
@Michael Skadden
You seem to be presuming that the cost of national health care would be cheaper than private insurance, but government services are very cost inefficient. Citizens would see their taxes increased tremendously to cover such a program. And people would no longer have a motivation to stay healthy if they know there would be no additional costs to them when they get sick or need operations.
1
@Robert How is it then in countries where there is national health services, the health cost per capita is much less than here, and life expectancy is longer? I was a participant in the national health service system of Spain, and it seemed to work fine...and Spain has a longer life expectancy that the US. Also, the taxes you pay end up being a lot less than what you pay for co-pays and insurance in the US.
10
It seems to me that if quarantine is mandated and controlled by the government, then the government should be covering the costs, if not directly, then by requiring that all insurance plans - including Medicaid and 'junk' plans - cover government-mandated quarantines.
19
Great advertising for Medicare for All.
We can't have one set of rules for "regular" health care issues (too bad you can't afford to see a doctor) and another for "emergency" health care issues afford to see a doctor) and another (EVERYBODY needs to be seen! Price is no object!!), especially when the condition initially appears to be "nothing," until it's clear that it's something else.
People can't be afraid to seek care early. The country can't afford the risk.
On to paid time off from work when people are sick and more telework/distancing solutions. We have the technology to do that woth many jobs (why they are outsourced to have them done in foreign countries). We lack the will to in insource it to our country.
14
The article argues that it would be immoral to charge a quarantined patient, since he had no choice in the matter and his hospital stay was mandatory.
But here's the rub: All hospital stays are mandatory. Nobody goes to the hospital for the fun of it. This disease just makes clear how absolutely ridiculous the current medical billing practices are in this country.
22
It isn’t just the bills, it’s the super-inflated charges behind the bills that drive people to drink.
21
@MJ2G - While I realize you probably weren't speaking strictly literally, drinking in response to medical bills is somewhat counterproductive, given the horrifying effects alcohol has on the body. It's a poison, and the body reacts to it as such.
1
It seems the only time that we hear about coming together as one nation and uniting for freedom and liberty is in the context of armed conflicts with a changeable cast of Orwellian enemies and most of this 'patriotic' blather is aimed at the young who happen to be both impressionable and of military age. Other than that it seems to be each one of us on our lonesome against the powers that be. We are told that our strength as a country stems from rugged individualism and any attempt to form a coalition is socialistic,(rhymes with communistic). What other country on earth would keep a man quarantined for the public good and then charge him four or five thousand dollars for his hospital stay?
Eisenhower's military-industrial complex appears to have expanded to include the medical 'industry' and how sad is that?
19
In Canada a private ambulance trip to the hospital can cost up to $146. Then any further hospital care is totally free. The only things you pay for are glasses, medications and dental services ...and ambulance ...and these are covered 80% by your work health insurance and 100% if both you and your spouse work. Seems like Americans are being totally fleeced.
39
@Budley
Please don't say healthcare is "totally free". That notion is "jumped on" by opponents of, and is hindering our efforts toward building a better system. Rational people know nothing is free. What we should recognize is that we spent more than twice, per capita, for healthcare than other developed countries (including Canada) and should be working toward the development of, and funding for, a better system using the many models available as examples.
3
@Budley
Good points, with any reformed health insurance initiatives by Democrats, the public will still have to pay a portion of the cost, and elective medical services is out of pocket. The sticking points are the uninsured. Republicans have disdain for the poor cf rejection of insurance subsidies. This divide is entrenched in America: the ambivalence toward the undeserving poor.
3
I was in an automobile crash late 2019. Induced coma and broken bones was the order of the day in hospital. I left hospital three weeks later. Albeit in a wheelchair. All recovered now.
When I got home, the only letters through the mail were get well soon cards, no hospital or ambulance bills.
The UK is using designated hospitals as quarantine locations were folk stay for fourteen days to monitor the virus. There is no direct cost or billing for this. Repatriated Brits are not being gifted ambulance bills when they return home virus clear.
NHS in the UK is not perfect, that's for sure. That declared, they mended me and countless others that needed their emergency care. All done with the latest equipment and drugs and qualified staff.
I read that UK costs for some medications are approximately 20% that of my US friends. All done without me having to further stress about a bill. We do not get billed here.
Universal Health is a 1st world norm. All but the US feel that way. Pharma and hospital lobby groups are still proving too powerful and generous to your decision makers!
Fingers crossed this terrible virus is extinguished soon.
35
A single-payer, universal healthcare plan is essential.
No co-pays; no deductibles; no plans; just healthcare.
The active-duty military uses such a system.
Yes, your taxes will go up but not as much as you are currently spending on your insufficient plan.
Get smart America. Demand single-payer, universal healthcare coverage. Peace.
30
Clearly our government needs to think through how we approach mandatory quarantine and testing. Our elected leaders need to lead. This epidemic highlights just how broken our healthcare system is; however to blame the doctors, ambulance companies and hospitals as profit hungry for charging for the care places the blame where it does not belong. These care providers (who are risking their health and their family’s to care for others) need to be paid for their services - short and simple. If you are outraged by this article then please be informed when you vote this November.
5
@D Jones I understand your argument that the Drs. nurses et al. need to be paid. Totally get that. I think you're being misguided here. However, I don't think anyone here was "blaming" the Drs, hospitals at all. I think they are questioning-if this is government-mandated and done so for the good of all then the government should pay! If we had healthcare for everyone, they would all still be getting paid. Right? Of course, they would be.
Keep in mind to which I doubt you know what Trump has done to the very organizations that were in place to help keep Americans safe from pandemics and the like...he fired, gutted funds, and got rid of it because Obama did it. How, pathetic is it that a grown man who calls himself a president has systematically disabled, cut, killed, fired everything done by Obama just because of Obama!
I don't understand your "outrage" over this article. Why are you so outraged? It seems to be an issue that should have been set in place before now! But once again I shall say Trump and the Trumpublicans have torn it up over their hatred for Obama and all things democratic. That sir should be your outrage!
Read the comments from the people from Canada and the UK...that would solve the outrage! Everyone should be covered with healthcare. Period. Why is that? Because you and the rest of you who think the right to have affordable healthcare is only for the ones who can afford it is shameful and foolhardy, to say the least.
3
From a young age I have often wondered about the possibility of a 21st century Typhoid Mary working at a truck stop on the New England Thruway. A sick employee without sick time or health insurance forced to come to work so he can pay his rent. That sick employee making a bunch of sandwiches is wearing gloves but he innocently touches the apron he just sneezed upon. Within 24 hours you could have a carrier in at least 48 states. We have just added a chapter to a terrorist manual. I was hoping the book ended with the use of automobiles to mow down crowds or exploding runaway railroad cars. This Coronavirus or something similar would make the US fall to her knees because we can not figure out how to pay for universal health care. All of this personal responsibility dogma might actually kill us off. Somethings need to be paid for in the name of public safety and homeland security.
22
@Sylvia Augustus Thank you! Very well put. Maybe some might be able to understand. Peace!
2
@Sylvia Augustus Typhoid Mary is apt; your described worker is more likely to be female.
Despite the constant negative reporting regarding the coronavirus in Italy, there's something Americans should keep in mind: if you need to seek help or treatment here, for this or any other problem, you won't go bankrupt or face huge bills, you won't have to deal with the vulture collection agencies, attorneys, insurance companies or the other myriad scammers associated with health care in the States.
If the virus spreads in the States, there's going to be a lot of financial strife along with all the problems associated with being sick. As others have written here, perhaps this is a wake-up call for Americans to consider the un-sustainability and un-affordability of your system. There are better models that work.
22
@mrfreeze6 Not only that but there will be a boatload of people who do not seek medical care because they have no health insurance and no money to pay for care--therefore they get sick and die...and how many others have they spread the virus too? Poor men. Rich men. a virus will not give a whit if you are rich or poor it will kill without any conscience. Stay safe Italy. Peace and Prayers for you!
2
Is a Bernie presidency fighting for universal health care looking a lot more attractive to everyone?
24
Just another reason why we need Bernie Sanders' Medicare For All!
21
National crisis. National Health. So simple. We all pay. We are our government. No individual should ever get a bill for these government mandated care and treatment. Of you get a bill... mail it to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Let Donald pay it.
12
Soon to become the new mantra in the US:
"How do I pay for this?"
9
@Reverend Billy Excuse me, but that has been our mantra since...birth as a Nation. Oh, except the super-rich preachers and politicians and large corporations and the CEO's
1
I can't help thinking of the Obama-haters/Trump lovers who eagerly abandoned their own insurance coverage under ACA in order to help Trump achieve his goal of eradicating
Obamacare. Of course some supported their own destruction because they didn't realize that ACA and Obamacare are synonymous. They can console themselves now by also refusing to believe in science, disease or pandemics. Then, if they can crawl to the polls they can eagerly choose Trump again!
10
How is it that the public is paying way over $100 million dollars for Trump to play golf and yet the government has not set up a fund to pay for these forced quarantine cases that are meant to protect the public at large?
29
The simple acts of having a highly regarded medical team in charge of this Coronavirus effort instead of political appointees,
a coordinated effort by the CDC and state governments to alert people to the medically equipped hospitals in their area should they show signs of Coronavirus,
a federal-state mandate that all showing signs of the Coronavirus should be, without penalty (like jury duty) , be given the time off to be tested and quarantined,
Kits with soap, hand sanitizer, and instructions for preventing the virus,among other things, should be widely available and free. Many cannot afford or find the basics.
All of these things would help allay the fear and the panic. People need information, instructions and a plan.
Without those, we don’t know anything...except we can’t visit China or Iran. And are chances of getting this virus are low...for now.
6
Health care is a right. Without health care for all America is not a great nation.
Many Americans without health care or work leave will not stop work nor seek medical help.
National Health Care for all.
17
This article highlights the woeful state of health care in the US. We funnel untold sums into the coffers of private health insurance companies, in exchange for absolutely no benefit to our people. Charges by hospitals and doctors are byzantine and out of control. The rest of the west manages this quite nicely. What is wrong with us?
14
Seriously--show me anyone who truly "loves" their insurance, as moderate democratic candidates have been saying. It's a joke, they may love their doctors, but these ongoing insurance nightmare stories show that the greatest American myth is the scam called "insurance." It only ensures that it won't cover everything.
19
@Muddlerminnow Agreed, I have never met any of these people who supposedly LOVE their insurance company, medical or otherwise. I do know a few people who've retired from government service and have decent enough coverage they don't seem to worry about being bankrupted by a medical problem. But I can count those folks on one hand.
4
@Muddlerminnow Thank you for bringing this up. When I hear moderates like Klobuchar talk about how Americans will be "kicked off their health insurance," I want to vomit. Our current system of through-the-roof health care costs and insurance that exists to maximize profit by denying benefits is insane. American families need a second salary just to pay for out-of-pocket medical expenses, but it had better be a good salary if the family is to afford daycare.
6
This is America. We’re too great to keep our citizens from going bankrupt due to medical expenses.
10
Vote wisely.
Vote Medicare for All.
14
This system is unsustainable and immoral. When will we have the courage and political will to at least try single-payer? Keeping this profit-driven healthcare system and hoping for different results is truly insanity.
13
Unless it is a rare case involving known life or death situations, the Best thing you can do is Avoid completely All medical staff and All hospitals.
5
Maybe a coast-to-coast pandemic is what it's going to take for the "But Freedom & Venezuela & I Like My Private Insurance" crowd to finally realize it's time for America to join the rest of the First World and adopt a universal single payer plan.
Because, guess what, this virus doesn't care whether you're in a Blue State or a Red State, and it most certainly doesn't
care about your employer-provided healthcare plan.
14
Where is that 'greatest health plan ever' promised by Mr. Trump? 'Been waiting for close to 4 years. It could be real useful now!
15
Coronavirus
The disease does more than Sanders can
To justify his healthcare plan.
For people who can't pay the bill
A hospital's a useless frill.
And if getting them to examination
Is what it takes to save the nation,
We've got to find a different way
Than a healthcare system based on pay.
13
For avoidance of doubt, ambulance service are included in our socialised medicine National Health Service. FREE. That's the full monty emergency vehicle plus, if appropriate, motorbike paramedic services in cities and/or elsewhere, air ambulance helicopter casevac. Yes, a free helicopter. It's all without charge. And, if on medical grounds, you're unable to attend hospital clinic appointments, the ambulance service will pick you up from home and drop you back afterwards (1). Again, with no charge.
That's an inclusive service. You don't pay extra for morphine, endotracheal tubes, gas n'air, IV cannulas, plasma expanders and so on. Where appropriate, the paramedics will patch you up at the roadside - dressings, bandages etc, rather than taking you to hospital.
Are you sure you guys have got your 'health system' right? Like, run for the benefit of citizens?
(1) Albeit to their timetable, rather than yours. But, some seniors regard the episode as an interesting day out.
11
@nolongeradoc It's not free, you are paying the taxes that fund the health services, but it's a fine way to allocate funds and we'll be pleased to get the same here.
Bernie needs to order some ads based on this immediately. He'll have the nomination wrapped up by super Tuesday.
10
Our modern feudal lords, who own the system and its political class, live by one creed: “All for ourselves and nothing for other people, seems in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations). Yet how are we not fundamentally all in this together? Those of use without coverage or inadequate coverage simply will not get the necessary care we need, and in the end our suffering and ailment will impact all. Auden’ original sentiment is right: “We must love one another or die.”
8
Thank you Donald Trump and the Republicans for giving us the best health care, a booming economy, and for making America great again.
Oh, all these things aren’t true? Millions and millions of people with substandard insurance?
Who knew??
12
"Mr. Wucinski’s employer, a standardized testing company, did provide health benefits when he lived in China but does not offer coverage in the United States."
Lord! The employer/corporation knows that their worker/executive employee is at risk for death due to this highly virulent virus and YET when the government steps into to evaculate the employee from harm, does the employer say anything of gratitude to the US Military?
The US government is saving the employer all kinds of money including possible benefits that might have extended for years to take care of the child in the event of her father's death.
Come ON employer STEP UP!!!
3
This is a reflection of the rent seeking mentality & corrupt business practices infecting America’s predatory version of capitalism. Profiteering and price gouging exist on all levels of insurance and medical care, “everyone” (exaggeration intended) is sent a bill regardless of ability or responsibility to pay. PR schemes are set up to deflect attention and criticism especially by the for profit health delivery systems and the pharmaceutical industry. The industry hides from scrutiny behind HIPAA & claims of protecting patient “privacy” while engaging in manipulative & aggressive billing practices. Why should a potential pandemic change a very profitable business model unless it provides another opportunity at wealth acquisition. If the people who voted for Trump expected he would look out for them & protect them from crises like this they were mistaken. He’s already playing the victim & looking for excuses for his administrative incompetence. The people who worked in the government to “protect and serve” are the very ones Trumps cronies & sycophants are driving out. Imagine if the Coronavirus were much more deadly than it already is, what then eh? With a fragmented & greed based health care system and a hollowed out & corrupted government dominated by Trumps opportunistic political operatives who are you gonna look to then? The Trump economy is a tragedy with a patina of affluence waiting for a feather to topple it, doubt it? The stock market had its worst week since 2008.
9
He left his pneumonia-stricken wife, whose father had died, in China? So much for "for better, for worse; in sickness and in health." Wow. I hope the wife has improved.
3
@Lynn in DC screams mail order bride, or child birth tourism
To save his child. Any parent would do same.
@Traisea Which child or children have contracted coronavirus?
Wait... What? I will now have to pay for is medical bills? Why me? OH... i forgot he does not have health insurance. Wait until it hits WV, the coal mines of PA. And other red states or areas. All of a sudden socialism won’t sound so bad.
7
Now "Medicare for All" is suddenly looking better. Mandatory isolation along with tests are not affordable to the average person. The US government needs to find a way to take care of these people. Typical company reaction to say the man and his daughter aren't covered in the US.
14
And this is an excellent example of why Medicare for All is so extremely important. Even outside pandemics, people without coverage can spread diseases to those with health care who will then have to pay huge deductibles and endure the malady. Why are some members of the 99% so intent to deprive themselves of programs in their best interest as well as the country’s. Maybe it’s because the corporate media keeps telling them how to think and who to vote for.
21
I suspect the health care facility is following established procedure, until further guidance is provided from above. Of course, I believe that the prudent and decent thing to do is not charge anyone for mandated quarantine care. Congress should act on this, immediately.
21
“Guidance from above”?
Mike Pence ? The odds on divine intervention are much greater.
Imagine if we had a way of taking the greater than one trillion dollars of equity value that vaporized from the stock market this past week and invested it in public health.
Imagine.
33
If I had corona like symptoms I would not go to the hospital if then I have no choices in treatment, mandated to stay in quarantine and mandated to pay the bills for it.
I have insurance, but too high in co payments to use it
Such is life in the US at this point.
41
@Nina Jacobs I know where you are coming from! Private insurance plans at best cover 80% of most hospital costs. People who have worse plans, or none at all won't go near a hospital, or take an ambulance. The disgraceful U.S. healthcare system guarantees this pandemic will spread widely in our country.
3
@Nina Jacobs I know where you are coming from! Private insurance plans at best cover 80% of most hospital costs. People who have worse plans, or none at all won't go near a hospital, or take an ambulance. The disgraceful U.S. healthcare system guarantees this pandemic will spread widely in our country.
@Nina Jacobs
and you would prefer to spread it to others? What is your scenario? who would care for you?
This would not be an issue under a Sanders administration. A universal health care system, such as Medicare for All, is the only solution. Health care should not be treated as a profit center.
33
@JA Many developed countries have large for-profit segments of their healthcare system but cover everyone and spend less
There is no reason why a well designed system can't leverage competition and the efficiencies of for-profit providers while covering everyone for a price they can afford -
19
Any Dem candidate supports better affordable healthcare. Warren is actually trying to figure out how to pay for it.
1
@Meg I love Warren and Sanders. Even if neither become president, they are both still senators and can influence how a Democratic senate works toward universal healthcare.
1
Both quarantine and treatment are public services - as in fact is maintaining the health of every citizen, if you think about it. We have a mercenary, profit driven 19th century health care system which is not adequate to make us safe from an epidemic nor is it adequate to provide safety and security to most American families. Seize the moment: this is a demonstration that a universal, single payer, organized, national medical system is imperative in the 21st century.
44
I took my son to the urgent care after he complained of a bad headache. He had been on a youth ski trip and fell a couple of times but never blacked out, slept well that night, ate dinner and breakfast without a problem...Our co-pay was only $20.
The urgent care doctor immediately "diagnosed" a concussion and sent us to the ER without even taking his temperature.
In the ER, within 5 minutes, he was diagnosed with the flu.
$750 later...Despite fighting it, the hospital sided with the doctor and I had to pay.
Our system is designed to make money first and treat patients later.
59
@Cab
That’s literally true.
3
When I see my doctor, I googled what are the possible causes of my symptoms, and ask the doctor why he thinks that is the cause. There is a reason why people mark their leg to remind doctor which is the correct leg to operate on.
5
@Cab Did he hit his head when he fell? Was he wearing a helmut? Did the Dr. do a nuero exam on him? i.e look at his pupils with a light? check his reflexes etc. 750$ perhaps for his expertise in diagnosing a possible brain injury immediately?
Presidential candidates keep telling us our profit-driven "healthcare" system is so wonderful and bad old Bernie Sanders is trying to take it away from us. Of course, the threat of exorbitant and undecipherable medical bills will deter people from seeking treatment, so cases of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases will go undetected, and will likely lead to preventable deaths. My neighbor works for a company that provides coding and billing services for physicians. He told me the company is building a new five-story building, which his company will occupy in its entirety. This is where so many of our healthcare dollars are going.
63
I agree with Mr. Gostin. High charges for mandatory isolation could make patients avoid seeking needed medical treatment.
If some people don't cooperation with public health officials unless their condition becomes critical, then more people will get infected.
Submitting to mandatory isolation is hard enough without worrying about the financial difficulty that you could be causing for your family.
52
Our government needs to immediately create an office that will straighten out this situation. A mediator, a patient advocate, whatever you want to call it. I can’t sort out the ethics, but if this man is not getting any answers to his questions, the government has a responsibility to him to sort out the situation ASAP.
32
@Pamela Mcclain
“ Our government needs to immediately create an office that will straighten out this situation.”
I believe Mike Pence is heading up things.....
Good luck with that.
@Pamela Mcclain At this point, with this administration nominally in charge, I have to agree with Saint Ronnie of Reagan: Government is more the problem than the solution.
America doesn't have the funding to support healthcare for all. We need to spend more than any other nation on the planet on our military budget--700 billion dollars a year. So, as you can see, we have our priorities, and other nations have their priorities. The United States wants to maintain power over the world. That costs money. Other nations want to have safe countries with free education and healthcare. We can't have that. There's not enough money. What's not to understand here, people?!
126
@Regina Vakde We already pay for 'healthcare for all' - just in the most inefficient way possible. This case is an illustration. The hospital mentioned waived their fees - but are actually shifting that cost to paying customers through higher rates
4
@Regina Vakde Well, by your argument either Bloomberg or Steyer should be mopping the Democratic primaries...
1
@Regina Vakde Yet we have the funding for trillion dollar tax cuts , which the government has to borrow to fund, for the 1% who don't need them. Go figure.
1
In Canada we just go to any doctor and it's all paid for. My dad who had open heart surgery - paid for. My nephew who was a premature baby needing hospital care for 6 months - paid for. Sure we might need to wait a bit for elective surgery but when my family needs medical care we get it same day, no cost. And that includes newly arrived immigrants who before long pay taxes and contribute to our collective well being. No insurance middle man, no co-pays, no denials due to pre-conditions - world class care at half the price per person than the USA. I never see a bill. Our medical system needs more investment too and it's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination but I can't imagine not having health insurance or free access to care. I don't understand why so many of my american friends and neighbours are attached to their inefficient and unfair medical system. I really hope this is the year you embrace the march to universal health care. If those that can afford them want to keep their private plans, let them. Best to all.
187
@matt When a country has become a hegemonic empire it can not risk adopting a soft-hearted, caring mentality. The effect it would pose on the culture could eventually put at risk the sort of mentality needed across the population to support empire.
13
@R.R
It is a total fallacy that US citizens pay less in taxes than, for instance, Canadians, or the French. If you add in the costs we in the US have to pay out of pocket for things such as healthcare, childcare, commuting costs, that ARE covered through taxes in other countries, we end up actually paying more. So, yes, your marginal tax rate may be lower in the US, but in the aggregate, we pay more out of pocket and don't get services that most other first world countries' citizens get through taxes.
22
@R.R you’ll trade faster access to elective surgery for the health and well being of everyone else. Nice.
4
We're very lucky that a highly contagious disease like COVID-19 is not as lethal as Ebola, or even SARS or MERS.
We need a healthcare system designed for the 21st century. COVID-19 is a warning shot. The climate crisis is expanding the range of tropical diseases. Antibiotics are losing their efficacy. Global air travel and international supply chains make the international transmission of disease more likely. Increasing population density as more people move to cities creates giant Petri dishes.
The 67 million Americans uninsured or underinsured, with no paid sick leave are 67 million potential 'Typhoid Marys.' About 80% of those infected with COVID-19 have only mild symptoms, which means that they are motivated to go to work or school and to avoid the hundreds or thousands of dollars in medical bills a visit to the ER could produce.
I'm not offended if an underserving miscreant or an illegal resident gets government-paid medical care if that protects me and mine from sickness or death. There are a lot of benefits to universal medical coverage, but the most important is that it is a necessary part of our defenses against epidemics.
We have to stop talking about how expensive or politically difficult it would be to have universal medical care and focus on getting it done. An upgraded version of Medicare looks good to me and a single-payer system would be the most cost effective. But however we do it, we must do it. Millions of lives depend on it.
77
The Coronavirus per The DAILY podcast heard right here at NYT is believed to be akin to the Spanish Flu of 1918 in severity. Whatever 45 said, not that, is my go-to. He lies about everything why not this.
2
@writeon1
And we rely on China for our medicines. We are not equipped to make our own medicines if China suddenly stops supplying us. How incredibly stupid and irresponsible is that? Trump is playing trade hardball and all China needs to do is threaten to stop sending meds. The GOP and corporate Democrats and corporate press have done this to America. They only care about money and not if people die.
An ambulance ride to the hospital, just 2 miles away, for a police ordered mental health evaluation typically costs $2200. When it is ordered by a government official like the police or a federal official, it is basically involuntary. I had 3 of them. Although I had committed no crimes except to be labeled “ a possible threat to others or failing that, a threat to myself”, I was billed for the officially sanctioned and ordered without my consent, “services rendered“ but never needed. The ambulance company has to make a profit. No one cares really that much about patients.
45
@Milque Toast
Question: Wouldn't transport by city rescue have been free? Ambulances are privately-run companies. I'm not arguing, just trying to understand.
I needed a rescue for a critical medical issue and paid nothing.
1
@HotGumption Some cities use private ambulances when their public EMS can't cover all the calls, and patients generally don't have a choice about who shows up when they dial 911. Alternately, a public EMS company might still bill a patient for transport, but an insurance company might only cover this cost for a diagnosis that the insurer deems worthy of ambulance transport. Or a patient might have a high deductible, or no coverage at all. It's a hot mess out there.
11
Where I live in California the ambulance service is provided by the city fire department. When I broke my leg, the 3 mile trip to the hospital cost $1400. However, they would save my house from a fire for free.
7
So many good comments on the need for universal health coverage here. The reporters for this story called the hospital mentioned; why didn’t they call all the ‘moderate’ Democratic candidates, for their views? Why didn’t they call the White House, and ask if they were going to ‘socialize’ the cost of the epidemic/pandemic, or is capitalism going to take care of things for us?
Aside from this virus, as long as you have even two competing health care systems, insurance plans, the rates of repayment, networks, covered events- will be in competition. And I’m still waiting for all these moderate candidates to tell me what happens when a doctor’s office says ‘no new Medicare patients’? And why would they, if the payment level is below other insurance. Moderates have been swooping vultures over the cost of progressive ideas; call them on this small taste of surprise billing. That happens every day. Holding my breath.
21
@Jo Williams "if the payment level is below other insurance" Because Medicaid reimbursement is based on a fair charge for the service rendered whereas private insurance is negotiated with the hospital/network which has no relationship to what it actually cost to provide the service. Usually its tantamount to gouging.
14
Jo,
I’m going to disagree with you on the notion that US private health care plans are in competition with each other - in the free market sense that you allude to. Two stores selling identical products are in competition with each other. An entire medical system built on obfuscation, where consumers have little to no idea of any of the prices for drugs and procedures ahead of time is not competition. - it’s closer to three card monte.
26
Why healthcare reform is more and more urgent a concern. This is the best argument yet for Medicare for All.
63
@LI'er Please explain how Medicare for all would provide care for free to someone working and living in China. I'm a little confused about this.
Are you entitled to free health care in Canada if you live in Detroit?
@HL
First, the US is one of the few countries that mandates that its citizens - even if living abroad and paying taxes in their host country - also pay taxes in the US. My parents have lived abroad for 40 years, and have paid taxes in both countries for 40 years. So, it is likely that this person living in China is also still paying taxes in the US.
Secondly, would it not just be the decent thing to do to help a fellow US citizen? But if you want to look at it in purely selfish terms, you are also benefitting from his getting treatment and helping yourself in trying to contain the spread of the virus.
Third: yes, absolutely, a person living in Detroit who happens to have an accident in Canada would benefit from Canada's healthcare system. While they may not get all services for free as a Canadian citizen would, they will still benefit from a system with very reasonable prices. It's called compassion. I think we here in the US all suffer from PTSD under our heartless capitalist system and just have no idea what human decency looks like anymore.
6
I think the vast majority of Americans would recognize this story, unfortunately, as an all too routine experience in our health care system and its byzantine and extortionate billing practices. Save perhaps, the “mandatory” nature of Mr. Wucinski’s quarantine, the emphasis upon which I find somewhat specious. Are not the vast majority of visits to medical providers “mandatory?” There’s a real phenomenon of people avoiding visits to the doctor for fear of costs, and it often leads to them getting sicker and costing more both to them and the insured pool in the long run. But that’s not my idea of having an “option” or “choice.” Even basic checkups should be considered mandatory in a public health sense, since they can mitigate exponential costs and human suffering down the line.
39
@J.M. , I do not disagree in a broad sense. But in the case of the government requiring mandatory hospitalization for the protection of the citizens of that government, we should not wait for a better health care plan. We taxpayers owe that bill now.
16
@Kathleen Indeed, but the government has the authority and responsibility to force some austerity and accountability upon the providers, not just blindly pay whatever they decide to charge. Imagine, gods forbid, this person’s experience multiplied by a million. A pandemic should not become an exponential profit center for medical providers. This falls under the same category as war profiteering, which the government used its authority to restrict.
18
@J.M. Or they used to. I would guess that the Trump administration would never consider such a thing as profiteering existed, it’s just good business.
3
So, explain to me again why Medicare for All is so terrible?
Explain to me one more time why private health insurance with huge deductibles and surprise billing is so much better?
Explain to me again why spending a larger percentage of gdp than any other developed nation and still getting worse outcomes is so clearly the way to go?
There is one sane solution and that is Medicare for All. Anyone that tells you differently is selling something.
110
I was on Medicaid for one year when unemployed and it was great. My care in no way suffered.
5
@JW
And explain why America considers itself the 'best country in the world' while refusing universal health coverage.
America First!!!
2
How many families are going to find themselves in this situation? Separated from close family members and facing impossible bills? Trump’s big plan of “closing the borders” doesn’t even begin to address these issues. Probably because he just doesn’t care, at all.
32
@MS
errr I think you are suggesting that he might have a coherent concept of health care /public health/ and a fiscal plan to deliver it. But unfortunately he has none of those. He is after all a simple opportunist looking out for himself. He doesn't give a thought to the well being of any other citizen than himself.
4
@Tom Horan I certainly didn't mean to suggest that! It's obvious he has no idea what he's doing, nor does he care (except to the extent that it may affect his chances of re-election).
No one should make money on this virus. Expenses should be covered by our federal government. Otherwise, those infected will not seek out treatment and will infect others.
56
Why should anyone have to pay for ANY virus?
2
@Gerry Gollin - Not sure if you're being sarcastic or not, but just in case ... The subject here is people being held responsible for tests and treatment that the government FORCES them to have. Last I heard, the government wasn't forcing treatment or testing for the common cold on anyone.
1
Bernie are you reading this? Please make a Nationally run Ad interviewing this man’s billers. ask them who pays for this family’s quarantine?
Ask America who pays for the uninsured?
Ask Bloomberg? Ask Mayor Pete? Ask Biden? As Millions of Americans are left to ask themselves do I work and risk spread? Do I go to the doctors and risk enormous debt? Not just today but any day of the year
48
@Oh Ji For that matter, ask Trump and the Republicans who oppose any universal health plans.
4
This could be the test that finally breaks the US health system.
39
If the corona virus doesn't kill people the exorbitant medical bills will bankrupt thousands of people or keep some them from seeking help and lead to far greater spread of the disease. One more reason why universal health care is imperative.
51
If ever there were a "Well, Duh????" moment, this is as illustrative as any.
All costs of mandatory confinement for a non-criminal situation not of one's own making should be borne by the agency from which the mandate originated, period. End. Of. Story.
This is one of those truths that would have been evident to the authors of the Declaration of Independence. But to the federal government sanctioned way of American medicine, not so much.
There is no justifying logic, there is no compassion, there is no excuse for this. There is only buck passing. And it certainly doesn't stop at the Resolute Desk.
34
@Glen This, "Duh!" moment is about to morph into a, "Doh!" moment.
People will lie about having been in contact with known infected people and even hide to avoid hospitalization they can’t afford.
Denying one’s society universal healthcare has consequences. Buckle up, COVID-19 is going to be a nightmare in our cities.
35
@Anne that's why it is now officially renamed the COVFEFE-19 virus.
2
We expect people to quarantine themselves and miss weeks of work or go to a hospital with symptoms when they could be hit with a huge medical bill? On healthcare and compared to the rest of the world we are in the dark ages..
43
the average day in a hospital costs:
$4,293 in the USA
$1,308 in Australia
$481 in Spain
This is American insane, immoral, irrational, obscene human healthcare medical extortion beyond belief.
"We're # 1 !" in healthcare rip-offs.
It's time to end America's healthcare insanity and right-wing 'free-market' medical madness.
Vote for Medical For All.
Vote for progressive, humane health policy.
Vote Democratic.
63
@Socrates Or back Joe Biden, who is against a public option, and buy healthcare stocks.
3
Maybe Medicare for all doesn't sound so scary anymore.
31
Vote for Bernie Sanders, if you are tired of being robbed by the medical system and surprise bills. ONLY NATIONAL healthcare will lower the outrageous medical costs in the USA by getting rid of the insurance system and its profits
20
In the 1980’s my wife a makeup counter girl at a Macy’s had medical AND dental coverage. Since then the Republican have improved things.
33
Another version of Private Prisons for Profit. This get out 4 out of 10 people that I informally know will view the doctors bills as the larger rational threat. I got a 6 pack of virus for you and I'm coming over for the game.
We are going to make China look good.
19
This case illustrates the need for Universal Healthcare. When government mandates quarantine/hospitalization it is responsible for the bill just as it is responsible for the healthcare costs incurred by prisoners.
Clearly, this disease shows every American what it means if a victim of the Coronavirus has no healthcare insurance: we are all endangered, America is threatened. How can the champions of “free market” parasitic exploitation of healthcare expect the public to pay for mandated hospitalization or quarantine? Healthcare is obviously a National Defense priority that is being exploited by greedy thoughtless people and businesses. Is the Coronavirus going to be a profit center for hospitals? Coronavirus has invaded our country and we need an army to fight it and protect America. Who should pay for this army? Individuals as they each need it or all of us? So far, the uncertainty of our fragmented, piecemeal “free market system” has cost $6 trillion in stock losses in six days. Can we afford to delay Universal Healthcare?
22
$2600 for the ambulance ride to the hospital. Am I the only one who finds this obscene?
52
What a country this is. How will most people who get sick be able to afford such bills? This situation is the product of evil and malicious governance that has refused to listen to pleas for universal coverage for years. In fact the trump admin is making every effort to remove more people from medical coverage and trump promises he will destroy Social Security if he is re-elected, eliminating any hope for meeting medical bills from the elderly. I guess we need huge debtors' prisons - that's the only solution.
23
@J.Sutton Let's be proactive and start building those debtor's prisons now!
2
@Glenn Thomas Good idea. We'll need speciality geriatric debtors' prisons for the elderly who won't be able to afford medical care en masse. They'd perhaps be more like the refugee prisons we see at the border, with those big white sterile cold tents. We could also have special debtor's prisons for the children of those who can't pay - separated and lost from their parents forever, like we're already doing - good practice for the future.
1
And the healthcare -- or lack thereof -- is just the tip of the iceberg for families affected by this: How many employers are going to be sympathetic to your two-week government-mandated quarantine? You'll lose both your job and your job-related healthcare. Medicare for All now!
26
I did have concerns as uk has tested over 7000 and USA 450. Uk has 20 confirmed cases USA has 71. Testing should be free and you might be able to contain and manage this.
22
The virus doesn't care about your politics or your ability to pay. It is coming. Who pays for the needed health care is THE elephant in the room.
Our "beautiful" health insurance plans will kill us all in the end.
22
For comparison (I’ll put prices in USD), in Ontario (Canada) if you stay in a hospital in a shared ward (4 beds per room) it costs $0 per day for residents covered by our government-run universal insurance system, as there are no deductibles, no copays, and no “in network out network” distinction. For us, the whole system and every doctor is “in network”. If you want to upgrade to a semi private room (2 beds) it’s $193USD per day and a fully private room is $227USD per day. For non-residents of Canada the full price for a private room is $2117USD per day. Uninsured Canadian residents would pay $1411USD per day.
If you take an ambulance it costs $34USD if you’re part of the government plan. If you have no coverage the ambulance costs $179USD.
Our hospitals are privately run, and we have private insurance to cover medications, glasses, physiotherapy, etc. Our government insurance system covers hospital and clinic visits, tests and etc, but also has strong bargaining power to keep costs in line. This seems like a good balance and like it would be an acceptable system for the US. I’m not sure why the US system is so much more expensive, and why residents tolerate the stress and added expense of the private insurance system. In Ontario we rarely think or worry about medical costs. It would be great for the US to transition to such a system for the health and well-being of all its residents. The US is a proud and rich county: why not offer your citizens the best medical coverage?
37
THANK YOU for all that info. Here, we have people lying and telling us that your care is sub-standard because it’s socialized. These people are crazy.
Pray for us.
1
@Nick Well it's pretty simple actually. U.S. citizens are not offered the best medical coverage because that would not allow companies to reap billions of dollars of profits from over-charging people.
I worked for a health insurance company for a little while, they spent $40 million dollars fighting a law that would require them to pay taxes on profits over $100 million. As opposed to, ya know, spending $40 million on caring for sick people.
This Wuhan virus will bankrupt many Americans, just watch. The ambulance bill alone was obscene. If they'd rode an air ambulance, it would have cost $50,000. Our medical industry must be looking for a huge windfall from this.
21
Is America's heavily privatised healthcase system up to the challenge of a mass pandemic?
If people without health incusrance are deterred form seeking treatment by the size of bills or deductibles, there's a certainty the pandemic will linger far longer than is necessary and result in more deaths.
This could affect anyone - including the poorer white population that so avidly supports the President.
15
@John E Not to worry, "...the poorer white population that so avidly supports the President." will the Democrats for any negative results.
I figure Mr. Cucinski's bills will be canceled due to media publicity, if not government intervention/payment. So there's one done. But what happens for the next patient, and the next, and the next? The way our healthcare "system" is set up, we can't expect every provider to zero out every bill for every patient required to get tested or stay in hospital isolation. The providers would soon go bankrupt, leaving healthcare and the economy in even worse shape. The only option would be for the federal government to step forward and cover those charges--which may begin to lay the groundwork for a more comprehensive medical insurance program. Let us hope.
20
How anyone can consider the US the greatest country in the world after reading this article is beyond me...to me a great country takes care of all it’s citizens regardless of their means or lack of such...The US has a long way to go before they reach that standard.
43
@doug mac donald
I completely agree. And yet, sadly, in these comments you still hear people asking why the US government (meaning they) should pay for Mr. Wucinksi's bill if he lives in China? There is such a loss of compassion, common sense, and human decency. Everything comes down to a mean-spirited sense of "why should I pay for you, or care about you?" I think we all have PTSD from living in a country that clearly tells us "every man (or woman) for himself". It makes me very sad.
1
I’m a teacher and Army spouse once stationed in Germany for eight years. I taught in local German schools, paid German taxes and as such had access to German healthcare (as well as American healthcare via Tricare). Both are forms of universal healthcare and both are/were blessings when compared to how our adult daughter (BCBS) deals with insurance in America. With both Tricare and the German healthcare system - I never paid or pay (currently using Tricare) a dime to see a doctor. I make an appointment. I show up. And I leave when finished never having once pulled out a credit card or cash for payment.
Which is why it’s been such a baffling journey to help our young adult daughter through the ridiculousness of what is our American healthcare system for most people - I’m a highly educated woman and have a tough time helping her understand it all. I’m often left feeling stupid and inadequate while bumbling through her bills or copays or deductibles or yearly limits. I mean, whaaaa?
It shouldn’t be hard to go the doctor. I pray this reality for some of us can become a reality for all of us.
We live in the greatest country in the world yet most of us don’t understand our own healthcare system.
If you’d like to be able to make a doctor appointment, show up, then leave without paying - be mindful of your vote this November.
59
If there was a robust system of public health in place, designed to cover emergencies, this would not happen. The current administration must utilize their emergency spending powers to cover medical care for anyone suspected of having the virus. No one should delay care due to fear of cost, because in those few days they will infect others. This just makes sense. No one should be billed for protecting the nation from disease. We know that Pelosi understands, but does McConnell? Congress should immediately pass legislation that covers all associated care, with a three month look back period. Shame on hospital and doctors who seek profit from national emergencies! They should be fined. This is a national emergency, not an opportunity for increased profit.
11
While people are getting unaffordable bills for medical care remind everyone that Trump has cost the taxpayers over $125 MILLION playing golf. There should be a Times Square billboard for his golf outings expense,and another one showing how much government funds have been paid to Trump businesses not included in the golf total. The Grifter Scoreboard.
48
I suggest that Mr. Wucinski and others in his position file a Chapter 7 bankruptcy, which would discharge him any obligation to pay the bills described in this story. Let the service providers fight with the Federal government over payment and leave the virus victims alone.
5
Well he has to look at this realistically...like a business man. On one hand he has a lot of debt. On the other hand he must have some savings and maybe a house he could sell. He also has his own organs which could fetch a good price. And that child, there is his ace in the hole. She must be worth at least 50,000 on today's market (eyes, kidneys and other things. He has to realize that the MBAs and hospital administrators who control supply and demand as well as prices in today's health care industry went to school for up to six years to get to where they are and they are expecting a lot of money in fair compensation ... compensation for their effort and time in getting to where they are now ...perfectly positioned to enjoy maximum efficiency and a large chunk of the profit triangle . It's only just that we do right by them after all.
14
Americans' fear of universal health care is utterly incomprehensible to Australians, New Zealanders, British, Canadian and most Europeans, who live where everyone enjoys free or heavily subsidised health care. On this subject even a conservative politician like Britain's prime minister Boris Johnson is more 'socialist' than Bernie Sanders. Start recognising that this means 'for the social good' not the road to a communist dictatorship or whatever people fear.
33
@Angela I totally agree with you and support Universal healthcare - BUT saying 'everyone enjoys free or heavily subsidised health care' scares people off - In fact people in other countries pay for healthcare through taxes and according to their income - which is why everyone can afford it
4
@Mark Mark This fear is exactly what is incomprehensible. the fear that there is somehow something wrong with paying a levy at tax time to ensure an excellent health system for all. how many comparative examples in favor of almost anywhere except the US does it take for people to wake up?
1
Lets see, $2,598 for an ambulance ride that maybe cost $10 in gas and 20 minutes in pay for two EMTs. An average cost of $4,293 per day for a hospital stay. When will our lawmakers realize that this is insane. We don't have a health care system; we have a free-for-all in which patients are the victims of medical providers who charge whatever they can get away with. Faced with a looming pandemic, our country probably has thousands of potentially infected Americans too scared to get tested because they cannot afford it.
28
@Christy
Thank God Rush Windbag and Hannity and Carlson have top notch health care. for themselves and thier families....so they can spend thier air time telling thier listeners to reject Medicare for All or some version of it.....
"They got thiers" while they ridicule health care for the masses.....
But since Windbag said coronavirus isjst a cold, I guess we don't have to worry.
The corporation that keeps Windbag on the payroll should be boycotted too. Spreading false and misleading information should be a crime.
The companies sending these surprise medical bills and making huge profits doing so are the ones so desperate to stop Bernie Sanders. If Americans are more afraid of surprise medical bills than the Corona virus, the virus will ravage across America and other countries will be placing a travel ban on the United States. Medicare for all and a major strengthening of state and county health departments is long overdue, and this is the year the United States gets a really nasty surprise medical bill, sent by the Corona virus.
13
In China all coronavirus patients got free treatment. No charge, not a cent.
16
Those quarantined because of the fear of spreading coronavirus shouldn't be expected to pay for the cost of hospitalization. If this virus spreads as predicted, our medical services and insurance companies will be overwhelmed.
We haven't made the proper plans for a situation like this and now that this administration is manipulating the truth and how much information is available to the public, the public should take all necessary steps to both learn about this virus and protect themselves accordingly.
Don't expect to get the truth about this illness from this administration, as shameful as it may be. The only way they might possibly tell the truth, is if we face a tidal wave of the coronavirus.
10
The government should pay the costs of treating Wucinski and his daughter because it is in the public's best interest that citizens with coronavirus be treated. This is controversial in the United States because of the way the insurance and health care industries have taken control of American lives.
10
Under the powers granted me by being an American citizen, I hereby declare that, at least as regards testing and treatment for covid-19, Medicare for All is now the rule. You can repeat this declaration as well and you can enforce it by refusing to pay ANY medical bills associated with this testing and treatment. Pass it on.
10
Even if the government decides to pay the costs of quarantine and treatment, the working culture in this country is unsympathetic at best and punitive at worst to employees who should be staying home due to illness or possible infection. How many people living on the margins are going to take precautions when experiencing coughs and perhaps low fevers or who may have even milder symptoms? Calling in sick, even for a couple of days frequently costs you the pay for those sick days, along with the very real possibility of losing your job altogether. I would imagine these conditions are going to govern the actions of a lot of the working poor. Sad and scary.
21
Prisoners don't pay for medical. treatment. Why should someone under mandatory quarantine. Both are circumstances being forced upon people against their will by the government. Makes no sense.
9
Of the medical bill of $3,918, $2,598 of it was an ambulance bill for the ride to the hospital. Did they serve a full meal and offer free booze? Was the hospital in a different State? Wow.
17
All those bills should be mailed to Trump and let Mr. Expert on all things pay for them. To mail a bill after someone was forced in quarantined is beyond insulting.
12
Finally getting some facts about why shareholders do well as do CEOs and lots of others and how it all gets paid for. Rounding off 4K USA vs.$ 1300 a day in Australia vs $400 Spain for a day in the hospital (p.s. hospital workers are well paid-- the food is awful)
Well identify the beast for what it is predatory capitalism... and we need Single Payer Universal Health but more we need these ridiculous costs to come down... Cuts all around in salaries. A more even playing field... and no more shareholders.
7
If you had meager medical coverage and you became ill, why would you go to the hospital? The virus is present in America and many people don’t the money to pay for care. Doesn’t that sound like a health care crisis?
12
The scenario of massive outbreak of virus in USA is scary not only for the risk the illness itself poses but also we are so lacking in public health coverage. We are a family of four with more than decent income but unless government comes with some scheme wherein mandatory treatment are provided free of cost, I am seriously thinking of going to my parents country temporarily where even though it is less developed than US, the healthcare is of same quality and far cheaper than here
11
Welcome to America, where its citizens are bled dry over medical insurance, medical bills, and tuition, but no one who is in a position to correct the situation cares enough to do so.
Vote out every Republican. Every single one.
Vote blue no matter who.
24
This is EXACTLY why we need Medicare for All. This virus will be far worse in rhe US because people with symptoms will be afraid to seek medical attention. And you just know that with the private health care industry in the US that it will be private equity firms and Wall Street that will cash in. All on the back of the sick.
11
Another outrageous story about our broken medical system where patents are helpless, and hospital and medical providers gouge them. This must be fixed. Either Medicare for All or a Public Option for medical care are now mandatory. Wake up MAGA-heads. Trump is trying to make sure that you never get the medical care you need.
9
Uninsured people are afraid of bills.
Many insured people literally cannot afford to use their insurance due to deductible in the thousands.
They will likely delay seeking medical care and also still report to their jobs even though they are sick.
Recipe for disaster.
Does it make me a Democrat to say this?
13
And THAT'S just one example why any suggestion of free medical care makes sense.
How can you expect these "victims" to pay for coverage they were offered by the US government ?
Send the bill to Trump Mr Wucinski. He has billions apparently, let him pay it.
8
People with mild symptoms should refuse any and all medical intervention unless the government guarantees to them in writing that they are not liable for any expenses. Just take Tyelenol and stay at home. If the government wants to quarantine you, it is their responsibility to pay for it.
8
There is precedent.
If they haul you in for observation on a 72 hour psychiatric hold, it is billable and you will be charged. The placement of the hold is done by other than yourself and frequently against your will. But if it happens you will be required to pay.
Therefore I would expect that the people hauled in and quarantined will be expected to pay.
I didn't say it is fair. But then, life is not fair.
5
@Alternate Identity So, it happens and therefore....it should continue to happen? Explain the logic of absurd and inhumane precedent dictating current absurd and inhumane policy.
5
@CanadianAlly
Never said it was fair, never said it should be that way, never said it should be allowed to continue.
What I did say is that there is precedent for billing for involuntary and possibly unwanted medical services. Given the way things are run in the US I do expect them to try to bill for the quarantine.
Do I think it is right? No. Do I think it will happen? Yes.
The Trump administration and the GOP more broadly are doing everything the can to cut back and limit access to healthcare for the American people.
They also oppose worker safety regulations and policies that would ensure that all workers have paid sick leave and/or can care for a sick family member. And they routinely cut funding for offices that conduct research into public health and the environment.
We have two candidates running who propose to do just the opposite -- Warren and Sanders -- and several others who are willing to compromise with the GOP on this.
Americans will have a choice in November about which is the smarter, more humane, and cheaper path: 1) limit access to healthcare and paid time off, risking exposure to thousands more people, or 2) provide access to doctors and nurses when a person is sick, without fear of going bankrupt and/or losing the person's job.
I hope voters are paying attention.
15
And what about the poor and vulnerable living on the edge of homelessness? They are one medical crisis away. Healthcare extortion at its worst.
11
At stake here ultimately is control over your life - most especially control over financial matters involving medical problems and treatment. NOBODY should have to worry about huge medical bills striking them from unexpected angles at the very worst of times - when or just after an accident, illness, or in this case, a government-mandated quarantine. In most civilized countries, good quality medical care is regarded as a RIGHT which everyone is granted: when you get sick or injured you are taken care of, just as you are educated when you are young, and not hassled or censored by the government regarding your religious decisions and beliefs. In the USA, however, for the most part medical care is treated as just another commodity like milk, bread and designer shoelaces - with predictable results: everyone involved in the system is more interested in making a buck than in taking the best possible care of those that come to them for care. "Socialized" or communal medicine is NOT the same as communisim and should definitely not be regarded as such: its just that surprisingly uncommon kind of sense called "common". Vote for Bernie or Warren this fall, and join the rest of the world when it comes to basic human rights: take control of your lives!!!
9
This is great news for people who want this disease to spread far and wide. I will literally run from health care workers if I have a fever or sniffles.
5
I can’t decide if I should laugh or despair over the endless stream of shocking health care stories coming out of the U.S. I’m an American who has lived in Germany for 15 years and the contrast between America and my experience here really puts into perspective how atrocious the US system is. I’ve been to my general practitioner many times, plus specialists such as the skin doctor, cardiologist, to the ER with a severe kidney stone, etc. My son is 8 and has already been to the ER 4 times, three times transported by ambulance. Can you imagine - I HAVE NEVER - EVER - SEEN A HEALTHCARE BILL in these 15 years! I guess the payments are arranged directly between the healthcare provider and the public insurance company, but I actually don’t even know because it isn’t something I have to concern myself with.
My beloved American compatriots - how should I delicately tell you that your healthcare system belongs in the toilet? Public schemes aren’t perfect, but they are far, far, far superior to the clown show you all must unfortunately suffer under.
26
US health care is for profit. Having worked in an urgent care they cost a lot of money just to see a physician then testing and then paying for medications. Many people have high deductibles. Healthy people who don't to go to get medical care during the year never draw down their deductibles. A large amount of people don't have health insurance. That just compounds the problem. Basic health care from outbreaks needs to be covered by a stop national health care response. The GOP disallowed the Medicaid expansion for their unfathomable dumb reasons.
10
If anyone wants to see one of the great "funny but not funny" moments of TV ever, google this gentleman's name and the words "Man feared to have Coronavirus coughs thru interview, while holding his daughter, and borrows her water bottle, takes sip, and passes it back to her."
4
Coronavirus doesn't care about gender, color aka race, ethnicity, national origin, faith, education, politics nor socioeconomics.
There are three reasons to panic during the Covid- 19 crisis:
1. Donald Trump is President of the United States;
2. Vice President Mike Pence is in charge of the Executive Branch response;
3. Jared Kushner is a Senior White House Adviser.
16
It is morally wrong for healthcare providers to make a profit off people who are acting responsibly to minimize spreading the virus by going to the hospital when they suspect they are infected. If fear of massive bills keeps people from “turning themselves in,” the outbreak here will likely be orders of magnitude worse than in countries where costs are more reasonable.
6
Are these people serious? Is the so-called greatest healthcare system in the world interested in protecting the American public from this virus, or are tunnel vision focused on making a quick buck?
8
I find it better to be sick overseas. The care usually centers on science and service.
14
“I assumed it was all being paid for,” Mr. Wucinski said. “We didn’t have a choice. When the bills showed up it was just a pit in my stomach, like how do I pay for this?”
And so it begins. In public health, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
9
What's really messed up is that even if he had valid US health coverage of some sort we all know he still would have been sent random bills because the hospital doctor cousin's in law who isn't in network spent 30 seconds looking at an xray.
14
Given all the consequences of even the suspicion of having the Coronavirus, why would you see a doc or go to the ER?
9
In science, you can make two types of errors.
In one, you “find” something that really isn’t there. You fix something that didn't need fixing. That costs you time, effort, and money, which ultimately translates to money.
In the other, you miss something that really is there. You fail to fix something that needs fixing. That costs you efficacy, which in medicine ultimately translates to human lives.
It’s much easier to replace money than human lives.
In South Korea the tech infrastructure currently informs anyone with a cell phone where infected patients have been so that they can reduce community spread, know their own possible contact chances and make informed choices.
In the US the two people in charge of the Covid19 response can’t even know the gender of the first victim.
We’ve decided to spend lives instead of money. Par for the course when shareholders and lobbyists control the health coverage.
11
If the health care system and CDC were serious about containing this virus, they would make sure people who needed quarantine and care would be fully covered. As it is, people with little or no insurance will be thinking twice about going for care if they become ill with corona symptoms. I feel we are all on our own and there is little to no commitment for aid or containment or anything else from the government/Trump.
7
...”3,918 in charges from hospital doctors, radiologists and an ambulance company.
“I assumed it was all being paid for,” Mr. Wucinski said. “We didn’t have a choice. When the bills showed up, it was just a pit in my stomach, like, ‘How do I pay for this?’”
Mr. Wucinski’s employer, a standardized testing company, provided health benefits when he lived in China but does not offer coverage in the United States.”
Strangely enough, Medicare for All is looking very attractive right now.
And going forward, for perhaps thousands of us, Medicare for All will start looking better and better.
12
One Plan to rule them all
One Plan is kinder
One Plan to care for all
And in good health then find them
With apologies to Tolkien
6
In these cases, these hospitals shouldn’t be sending a bill at all. Aren’t most hospitals non-profits? Meaning they get a tax subsidy because they provide a community benefit. So, it’s time for them to provide that benefit instead of just taking money (in the form of massive tax credits) from the taxpayers without giving anything in return. There is a community issue happening and it’s time for them to show they deserve that non-profit status.
8
This family’s story illustrates the absurdity of the for-profit healthcare system we have in this country.
I hear opponents of universal coverage say things like “why should MY MONEY pay for YOUR CARE?”
Ethical and moral factors aside, the reason is that the basic health of a population is a public good, so the public must pay for it.
Americans have been spoiled in this sense: for the past ~100 years, geography and luck have mostly protected us from the horrors of novel outbreaks and pandemics (though HIV/AIDS is a notable exception). Climate change will most likely bring these events to our shores and our doorsteps more and more frequently in the years to come.
This family’s experience demonstrates why our profit-seeking health system is utterly incapable of handling the public health challenges of the future. Containing pandemics requires collective action and a coordinated, organized response at every level of governance. Our current system is incapable of supporting any of that because it’s set up to maximize corporate profits, not public health.
We must provide equal and affordable care to everyone who lives in the US in order to avoid the worst-case scenarios pandemics can bring.
But I shan’t be holding my breath — except when in public.
14
We need a lot more guidance. If X situation, do Y.
Is there guidance on when it’s time to go to a doctor or hospital?
We should follow official recommendations if they exist. But from what I am gathering, one should probably stay at home and self care (including quarantine oneself) if sick, and only go to the doctor if breathing difficulties develop.
Otherwise there isn’t much that can done for us, as there’s no medication for COVID-19, and we’ll possibly pick it up from others in an emergency room if we don’t already have it, along with some hefty bills and loss of choice, while overburdening the health system.
5
He lives in China and accepted an offer to evacuate.
Is he a US taxpayer? Would he be entitled to automatic Medicare in a single payer system? Would he be entitled to free care with no insurance under a public option or government subsidized plan?
He made a decision to evacuate without medical insurance or medicare in the USA. How would that be different under universal coverage for a foreign resident who retains citizenship but doesn't work or pay taxes in the USA?
Health insurance under a private and public or all public single payer plan isn't free. It's tax based and poor people are subsidized. This article needs to explain why he shouldn't pay.
5
@HL
Mr. Wucinski accepted the offer to be evacuated because he surely feared for his daughter's life -- with reason. He did not -- not -- accept an the offer to be locked up, then charged for the privilege. This really doesn't require an explanation.
5
Do you honestly think that private citizens are going to follow the government’s pandemic advice on COVID-19 if it bankrupts private families? This is precisely why countries like the UK have a single payer system.
Also, dis you miss the part where he abandoned his wife so his daughter could have better odds? That is not a decision you should be judging. Life has more value than that and our country should protect healthcare with the same ferocity it does firearms. Shame on you!
4
The US should declare a national emergency and give guidelines to hospitals about charging patients for mandatory quarantine. In addition there should be strict guidelines to airlines on passenger restriction for people that have flown to China or other areas in the world where this virus is prevalent. Even though there may be travel restrictions there's no way knowing if there person next to you on a domestic flight has been to one of these countries. In addition, the air handling system on all aircraft just recirculates the cabin air. There are some filters, but these filters are not biological filters, so in fact you are breathing everyone else's air.
This is not a Democratic hoax and virus won't abate when the warm weather arrives. If that were the case there wouldn't be a virus in the warmer sections of the world.
Trump and his team have to start taking this seriously as a communicable health risk and not just a financial crisis or an election conspiracy.
10
Thank you Canada for a compassionate health care system.
All Canadians , rich or poor are entitled to good care.
Just like many other advanced countries we don't think profit is a dirty word but understand that caring for others results in a happier, healthier society.
55
@Steve
Any other time, I would agree with you. But not now, in the middle of an epidemic.
When a thousand people simultaneously get seriously ill in a city that has one hundred ICU beds, it will not matter what kind of healthcare system they have. There is not one single country or city in this entire world which is prepared to deal with a widespread outbreak. Not one.
2
@A Cynic Where Canada's system pays off is in the nitty gritty of testing PLUS contact tracing PLUS notification of possible contacts so they can monitor themselves and self-quarantine if necessary. Public health departments at different levels of government share information across the country, allowing individual jurisdictions to step up their response as necessary in a fan-out.
We learned the value of this type of coordination the hard way during SARS, and have invested tax dollars in maintaining the system since then.
In the meantime we did catch the twin bugs of "gig employment" and loss of benefits like paid sick days, so those will likely come back to bite us. But at least we can still test people and trace contacts.
5
@Steve But the wealthiest nation in the world can't afford it? Canadians are lucky to have a government that looks out for the best interests of it citizens.
2
Americans have the opportunity to fix this problem. Warren and Sanders both have offered plans that would solve it. Other countries have solved it long ago.
Unfortunately, based on early election results, it looks like Americans have decided they prefer not to fix it.
You can blame the hospitals, the insurers, the government: but really there's no one else to blame but the voters.
62
Standard practice is to blame someone. That absolves the system and distribution of wealth. And that system is stagnant and senile. Human suffering will increase as long as we are in its grip.
2
Some people are recommending stockpiling medication as they feel that it may be hard to get soon because it comes from China.
I called my mail order drug company and they said they could not provide me with extra medication because the situation had not been declared an emergency situation.
I mentioned the CDC suggested the country be prepared before it became an emergency.
They said they could not refill my prescription early until an emergency occurred.
The I called the insurance company which employs the drug company same story. Some of my medications are important to keeping me alive.
So much for insurance companies being prepared.
So another reason for the elderly dying at a higher rate than the general public is because they will not be able to get their medication, not because they actually got the coronavirus.
30
@esp
I checked with the manufacturer of my one critical drug and was told it is made in India (as stated on the Internet) and no components come from China. This, at least, gave me some comfort. Beyond that, who knows what happens when my 30-day supply has been used up.
Likely those people of great wealth can pay out of pocket for months of drugs beyond insurer coverage.
Guess if it becomes a problem for me I'll take up carousing and whiskey, and go out dancing. No, Donald, you're not on the dance card!
3
@HotGumption
Well, India will be the next to experience the coronavirus and shortages of medication.
I just learned that my combo blood pressure medication from my mail order pharmacy is out of stock and will be for a long time. For the time being it is available from a local pharmacy.
I feel sorry for Mr.Wucuinsky. More families are going to face this crisis with the current epidemic of coronavirus.
American hospitals are a rip-off. Patients rarely know in advance what they’ll have to pay. Today’s healthcare system is badly lacking transparency. More and more patients receive bills in code, from doctors they never even saw
Even though many hospitals try to bill fairly for their services, others use the opacity of billing systems to maximize profits. In either case, patients feel left in the dark.
Take a standard imaging exam like a CT scan. One study found a 500 percent price variance for this test among academic hospitals and a 1,000 percent differential among private practitioners, despite most of them using the same medical technology and providing identical images.
30
@Padman
This is what happens when health care is the purview of profit seeking big business.
2
No matter how this health situation turns out, it provides the most important argument for a presidential debate come this fall. I’m sure Trump would rather skip that process regardless of who the Democratic nominee is, but if he does, he is just handing the Democrat an hour or more of free advertising on the national stage. I do not see how he cannot address his lack of leadership on this issue. We’ve been waiting to see his incredible plan for 4 years, well before he was nominated.
But then, who knew healthcare was so complicated?
52
The US system of health care is structured as a for profit, consumer driven, concept. The core elements of such a system is that the provider, manufacturer, service, is always right and has the ability to force an individual to pay. The key element here is the individual versus the structure. The underlying strength for the structure is that the individual will more often than not, pay rather than fight the issue at a greater cost. The profit driving force of this structure is to charge what the market will bear. This means inflating bills, billing the weakest element, the individual, rather than the strength of the insurance industry, and using the threat of ruining the credit of the individual.
Just as an individual has no choice but to seek help in this consumer based parasitical structure, the individual has little to no means to dispute a bill when it is bogus. The bottom line for the health care industry is to get paid as much as possible, or what the market will bear. The US is the only advanced country to use this structure. The American individual pays twice as much as the individuals in the three dozen higher quality systems throughout the world. The individual pays for the system that abuses the average American.
81
The Wucinski family's plight shows the Cats-22 of private insurance. The exorbitant costs of an ambulance and a day in the hospital are due to the exorbitant insurance premiums both industries are required to pay. Of course the insurance industry then gives us the choice of premiums that are budget-buster or high deductibles to reduce those premiums to merely budget stressors. We need a VIABLE National Health plan. Is Medicare-for-all the answer? I don't think so. I believe that the answer is some combination of Medicare-for-all and ObamaCare.
31
@alan We have, at best, half measures right now. The ACA bronze policy we have does not pay a cent until after $8,100 each is paid out of pocket. If we both got sick, we would pay $16,200 before the insurance company kicked in anything.
Meanwhile, BCBS receives $1998 PER MONTH from the government!!! That’s $24,000 a year, gor not providing ANY services.
People who are afraid of M4A just do not know what they are talking about. There is no system more designed to increase the profits of non-health care insurance companies. Remember, your insurance agent will NEVER take your BP. Not ever. Why pay for them at all?
10
@alan It's "Catch-22," Alan, and anybody who's read that novel was better prepared for Trump than those who haven't. God (or Chaplain Tappman) bless the late Joseph Heller.
4
@Michael Williams Sorry for the typo. It was Catch-22 that I meant. I'm old enough that I actually read it. I believe,though, that most realized that it was an early morning typo.
1
Just one more illustration of how dysfunctional the U.S. "medical system" is. It's a system for picking people's pockets, as opposed to a system providing affordable universal care, which is the hallmark of most other developed countries. No. those systems cost money too, and they're not perfect. But in general, Americans seem to have no clue as to how fundamentally flawed our "system" is.
94
@billsett I believe your comment is wrong. It implies that we have a system in the US. There is no system. Just a mad scramble among the participants to make money.
7
@DStein I agree.
While the hospital was expensive, the charge of $2,598 for an ambulance ride is eye-popping.
I'm too old, but I'm advising my children to go into the ambulance business.
35
@K D P - I live in an urban area. Two years ago, I walked my son 2 blocks to the ER of our local hospital (where he was born - I walked there 10 years ago in labor - walking is faster than driving there and parking).
What looked like a mosquito bite on his elbow had swelled to the size a small orange. My son had a major infection (took a day or 2 to confirm it was MSRA). The nearby ER got him started on IV antibiotics, but didn’t have in patient pediatrics. He needed to be admitted to a hospital less than 2 miles away. And we had to take an ambulance because of the IV.
My bill for the less than 10 minute ambulance ride was over $4000. I could have easily gone to the other hospital ER to instead if anyone had told me ‘this kid will likely need to be admitted and we don’t have inpatient pediatrics’. It would have been about a 10 minute delay in care, which in this case, would not have affected outcome.
$4000 to go less than 2 miles. The ambulance staff just loaded him into the van and drove (hospital staff had gotten him on the IV).
And I have Cadillac insurance.
77
@X
Similar situation here! In my case, there were two people in the ambulance. While both were slightly injured, one did not needed or received treatment. That person was just accompanying the other to the ER. We were charged $6000 for transporting two people.
15
@K D P
That’s the list price. Nobody pays list. Medicare would probably pay them a third of that price for the ambulance. It’s all part of the scam to slowly increase the “usual and customary” fee for services.
7
If the government orders treatment, including quarantine, in the name of the general welfare, the government should pay for it. It’s very simple. The people need it, want it, and require it. The people should pay for it.
43
@Barbara8101 Agreed, but the government (I.e., us, the U.S. taxpayers) should also be able to force some austerity and accountability onto the providers. Why should the taxpayers have to pay a usurious $2600 per ambulance ride? Imagine multiplying that ludicrously extortionate figure by hundreds of thousands or millions of ambulance rides during a pandemic situation. Makes it obvious that dramatic intervention is required to stop the wholesale inefficiency and looting in the health care system.
26
@Barbara8101 -----"He did receive a document upon leaving quarantine directing him to contact a government email address with any medical bills. He sent an email on Feb. 24 detailing the charges and asking what would be done.
“My question is why are we being charged for these stays, if they were mandatory and we had no choice in the matter?” Mr. Wucinski wrote in his message.
He has not received a response, he said. When contacted by The New York Times, a Rady Children’s Hospital spokesman said the physicians’ bill had been sent in error and that the family would not be held responsible for the charges."
Yes it’s much more fair to shove the ripoff onto individuals and only investigate when it’s gov money.
This is exactly the problem I was imagining the other day: Mandatory government quarantines and treatment within a private medical industry. How is a for-profit medical system integrated into a national health emergency? Not at all, it appears.
It is sickening how fast the medical service providers sent bills straight to individuals, knowing full well that their treatment was mandated by the government as part of a national emergency.
In a case like this, single-payer government health care is nothing less than a national security issue.
123
@Kathy the average day in a U.S. hospital costs $4,293, compared with $1,308 in Australia and $481 in Spain. In Canada it costs $0,00 ! If in the U.S. the virus doesn't kill you... the bills will severely hurt you. If you don't have Health Care insurance then the pain you will suffer will, for many, be a debilitating one.
The only good thing that this crisis may show the American people might be that Universal Health Care is a human right.
8
Whether you like Bernie or not, this article makes a pretty good argument for his universal health coverage scheme.
The only way this plays out in the US is the virus is going to spread because people can’t or don’t want to pay deductibles, or just don’t have coverage for testing.
I don’t see the current administration handling this well, and a lot of people are going to suffer as a result, and I suspect this crisis will lead to a change.
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@P Nicholson
Agreed 100%, but "Bernie = universal health care" contains two logical fallacies: it is possible to elect another Democrat and also enact Medicare for all (he doesn't have an exclusive on the idea), and even if he is elected such a system will not happen overnight, if at all, given his mental block on the concept of compromise. He's been a senator for 13 years and we are no closer to universal health care than when he took office.
I have a sense that the surprise bills directed toward Mr. Wucinski will eventually by dispensed with by the Feds. However, the incident provides valuable insight into how healthcare is structured in the U.S. That structure is designed to maximize the health of for-profit medical providers and insurance companies first, with ancillary benefits flowing to patients--particularly those that can afford them.
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@Alan R Brock
“For profit” has nothing to do with it. The ambulance was probably owned and operated by the County Fire Department. They send out the silly bills....
@John Perry
Look at the big picture, not just this one incident. Surprise medical bills in the thousands of dollars are endemic to the U.S.
1
A civilized society does not make the sick pay for treatment. A civilized society provides universal healthcare.
The US provides 2nd rate, expensive healthcare to the insured but 1st rate super expensive healthcare to the very elite.
This would be a good year to vote to be civilized.
178
@Louis J I just hope the civilized society bus didn't leave the station in November of 2016.
4
Would be. Unfortunately, half of the population has been so brainwashed by the GOP and right wing media that they can no longer make rational decisions.
1
Is his employer a US-based company? If so, why would he not have coverage in the States? He did not go to the hospital of his own accord. His treatment and his transport to the hospital was required by the government, which needs to reimburse the hospital et. al. for their services. Period. And, yes, single-payer insurance would eliminate at of this angst and ensure that anyone who feels sick gets treated.
39
@MFS
There is nothing in your - or any health insurance contract - that supports your claim that the gov has to be responsible for payment. The insurance companies - historically at three levels of approval - modified by ACA and largely gutted by Trump - can now again largely do what they want.
I agree we need to enter the first world in health cost and coverage
3
A powerful case for universal health care can now be seen each day - and will become even more evident in the future, with pandemics, climate disasters and more.
Who can pay the retail cost of medicine, especially when it is so much higher than other countries? And do we want people who are unable to pay for a test or a vaccination or a treatment - when the alternative is the ticking time bombs of uninsured people who will be prone to carrying potent and contagious diseases?
Universal health care insures us all against our weakest links - and makes us stronger, together.
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@Jake1982 what is your definition for universal health care versa Medicare for all? Just asking.
1
@Mary Lou
One and the same - by any means achieved where we'll all covered and not segmented into the haves and have nots - in a system driven by profit. I recently received a test for Zika - the blood test cost $2600 - and $332 was covered by my costly health insurance policy. Coronavirus tests are also quite expensive, meaning many will simply not get them unless the government pays and encourages people with symptoms to get them.
5
@Jake1982 The rest of the developed world has done this for many, many years.
1
The virus is here and spreading. The problem is, we don’t know how widespread it is because we aren’t doing testing. Testing needs to be standardized, widespread and FREE, and it needs to happen now.
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Maple Surple! Love it! I’m an old Vermonter, and it’s the season!
5
Emergency rooms are the last place people should be going if they suspect they have the possibility of the virus. ER’s are the perfect place to spread it to already health compromised people. There need to be some kind of testing centers or even home visits, as I believe they are doing in France. Ever been in a crowded emergency room on a Friday night?
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@Enlynn Rock In our city, the ER would be the only place we could go on a Friday night. We try as much as possible to avoid the ER in general but there have been many cases where that's the only place they will treat us because they are able to provide critical care/imaging if something gets worse.
4
@Enlynn Rock . Agree with this very important suggestion, not only for the USA but also for all other countries such as Australia. If we don't look after our Health Care Workers, they won't be able to look after us.
Of the many workers who I fear will fall sick and either continue working until they simply can not, or will decide their minimum wage jobs are not worth showing up for, are health care workers in assisted living and long term care facilities. These facilities are chronically understaffed and the workers underpaid. I could also envision these workers refusing to go to work where their health and potentially life is at risk for minimum wage jobs. From what I understand the old and feeble are most vulnerable to Covid-19 and these facilities will likely become highly infectious spaces.
80
Reading this in the UK, Covid 19 may or may not be a serious pandemic, but this phase, the containment phase is absolutely essential. Money and time invested now will make a difference. Surely charging for quarantine is the worst possible message.
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Health care is the one field in the US where any government can learn a lot from other nations. The aim should not be to imitate other countries, but to develop a system that exceeds all others in service and fairness. An ideal system should provide basic care for all, at no cost to the individual, paid by tax money. Models include the UK. Then there should be the option for insuring privately for advanced services, that could be done proportionate to the individual's income, or as a flat fee regardless of personal income. The flat fee is much fairer, as in all countries where the rate is proportionate to income, the middle class bears the burden of financing the system, as in Germany via insurance fees proportionate to income. In Germany, the middle class ends up paying more for health insurance than in the US, in terms of net monthly payments, while earning less gross salaries. A flat fee for all would also be fairer to all citizens, rich or poor, and more correctly mirror the fact that all humans are equal on some level. That is exactly what a model like the UK does, provide a level playing field. Of course, in the UK then the general income tax takes the money away again from the middle class. A fair system provides basic medical care for all, free of charge, via general tax incomes, and offers private insurances, and does not pay for this system by bracketing the personal income tax in a way that one or the other class has to bear the major burden of financing it.
24
I don't see why the flat fee is more fair than the income adjusted one. It is difficult to believe that the middle class pays more in Germany than in the US considering that the healthcare cost is, in general, significantly low in Germany. I guess you can argue in favor of flat fee, when you have flat salaries.
3
"Mr. Gostin worries that high charges for mandatory isolation could make patients wary of seeking needed medical treatment."
Mandatory isolation should be covered for those uninsured/poorly insured from the same budget that is spent on senseless military expenditures. Since the government is withdrawing from Afghanistan - this is should be the first source to look for funds.
"Doctors, who may be outside a patient’s insurance networks, provide services to hospital patients is one of the major causes of surprise medical bills."
This problem cries for regulations that would prevent any doctor to provide any services to hospital patients without accepting major insurance that the hospital participates in. This rule should apply to ambulance services bringing patients to hospitals. If we may expect some "benefits" from coronavirus epidemic is to block practitioners from providing services outside insurance networks.
45
I hear you. But the insurance companies don’t. In an effort to provide lower cost bare-bones plans insurance companies limit the provider network. Therefore the physician is left out of the network not by his choice but by the insurance companies decision. United healthcare advantage has left my partner and I out of their network even though we would be more than willing to see patients in the network. Our local hospital is in the network. What happens if the hospital requests our services through the ER? We are required to see the patients regardless.
Then we send the patient a bill. The only surprise is that the patient didn’t realize they were in a limited network in the first place.
19
@JF if ever there was a case for universal tax payer health care it is this country's response to this virus. And it's not just the insurance companies and drug companies that are taking advantage of sick people, as this article reveals about the cost of a hospital stay.
Insurance companies do not offer health care. They restrict it based on how they can make the most money. I have a hard time understanding why people in general equate insurance with health care.
4
@JF
Fascinating. The Medicare Advantage plans are a sop to the insurance companies... and IMO need to be abolished. Why is United Healthcare omitting you and your partner from their provider list? -- ensuring longer waits to see an MD? Frankly, IMO scandalous... and thank you for the info.
I will not have an advantage plan. I do have supplemental insurance which seems to pay nothing to MDs -- does betters with drugs.. Regular Medicare is good enough for me..
Do you have privileges at the hospital?
3
American employers and America in general is very stingy with medical benefits, sick time, time off to care for one's family or oneself. Other countries, some of them as developed as we are, do a far better job of ensuring that their citizens have access to medical care when and where they need it. In many of those same countries employees have far more vacation time and much more generous leave time.
Only in America do we penalize people for being ill, requiring medical care, needing more than a day or two off for sick time, and preferring to have employees come into work sick rather than stay home, at full pay, to avoid exposing others to their illness.
Americans are not bad patients. We'd be far healthier if we had leave policies and access to health care when and where we need it rather than when we can afford it. Don't look to this crisis to change things. It won't.
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@hen3ry Medicare for All. It's not a crazy idea. Just look at our military budget, & what we get for *that* version of socialism. For-Profit Medicine is what is crazy, & it's only propped up as national policy by those who profit from it.
9
The United States is likely to become the global center of the coronavirus pandemic since it feeds on four fundamental weaknesses that now plague our society, more than any other in the developed world: technical expertise stifled by bureaucracy, lack of adequate sick leave, no universal healthcare, and inability to muster coordinated public responses for the common good.
Dozens of countries now have functioning coronavirus testing modules, validated per WHO protocols, and have tested millions of people. South Korea alone tests over 10,000 a day. Yet two months in, barely a few hundred Americans have received tests even though SARS-CoV-2 is already demonstrating rampant US community spread, not only due to faulty test kits but also frustrating red tape that has impeded local testing development and even importation of kits from overseas. The hard-earned US reputation for bringing great technical expertise to bear is now permanently in tatters.
Meanwhile, potentially infected workers balk at taking sick days for fear of losing income or even their jobs. High deductibles or lack of health coverage discourage others from seeking medical treatment until the viral load and lethality are elevated, and public coordination is all but impossible amid our current polarization.
Thanks to this perfect storm, the USA is the ideal breeding ground for SARS-CoV-2 to spread rapidly, in its most virulent form, at the highest viral titers and with dismal rates of detection.
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As an NP, I have begun to encourage friends and family to stock up on non-perishables. I have prepared my husband for the possibility that he may have to stay with his father so that any potential exposure I may likely experience at work will not impact him. The report that Anthony Fauci, MD, has been barred from appearing on Sunday talk shows is more than worrisome. I am also concerned that different states are creating their own tests rather than all using one standardized test. For a country with so many leading academic medical centers, our response is woefully behind. I was at my PCP on Thursday and told him my fear was that in the West, we just don't have the commitment to quarantine that the Chinese were able to implement and he agreed. Sorry Mr. Trump; this isn't just going to go away on it's own.
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I’m also an NP, living near a possible epicenter. Agree with all you have said. We have no test kits. NONE.
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@J. Wes Ulm, MD, PhD
An excellent, informed, wise, pressing opinion. Thank you for posting. This is salvo for all of us.
I've already put in long-term provisions (dried lentils for soup, peanut butter, pasta, toilet paper etc.), have taken leave from my beloved gym, have cancelled social events involving crowds ... and have received raised eyebrows from extended family and friends. That's OK. As always I am pro-active.
(The wonderful checkout clerks at my supermarket are as much on the front lines as medical workers and I want to spend little time with them.)
And Chewy delivery is bringing food for the household critter. All set.
A thought for the erudite... forget library visits. Nothing can be more riddled with germs than books.
Call me over-cautious, but I'm content with my decision making. Dr. Ulm, you confirm my concerns.
29
"He did receive a document upon leaving quarantine directing him to contact a government email address with any medical bills."
This is a key piece of information that the article mostly ignores. A copy of this document could have provided some much needed clarity and helpful identification of what the payment procedures might be for those caught up in the coronavirus quarantine.
25
@dlb: It would be interesting to know if there is an actual system set up to manage patient bills incurred in quarantine.
But the patient, who may be ill, should not be responsible for gathering bills to document his government-mandated treatment. That should be handled directly between the medical providers and the government that mandated the treatment.
24
@dlb
Apparently it didn’t.
@Nb
We don't know that.
More reasons why the uninsured and the poorly insured will not seek treatment when they need it and they'll go to work at their jobs cooking food, waiting tables, and cashiering at big box stores because they'll lose their jobs if they take sick leave. The lack of affordable healthcare in this country is what will cause an epidemic.
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@Linda
So clearly and correctly stated. Thank you.
1
I think the health insurance industry is a sizable chunk of employment in America. I am unsure how large of an industry it is. I get that the costs for masks and gowns and gloves, and nursing, and cleaning of surfaces need to be recovered. People don't work for free usually. When one is hospitalized in isolation rooms, usually, nurses who gown up with each contact are protecting themselves, and minimizing risks to the patients.
4
Hard for those of us outside of the USA to understand the apparent fear of "socialised" medicine. Here in NZ, hospital stays are free to the patient, paid from our regular taxes. And so is most treatment resulting from accidents - doctor check, x-rays, physiotherapy etc.
311
I was thinking the same thing. It just seems so weird to get a bill for government mandated health measures from a private health care provider.
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@Emily S It's in part the influence of economist James M. Buchanan, who thought government shouldn't be involved in much of anything, including health care and education. He was immensely popular in the American South, where blacks and ordinary whites were (and largely still are) treated as cheap labor, nothing more. I live in a low-wage state where expansion of Medicaid (low cost medical care for low income people) is not going to be approved by the state legislature anytime soon.
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@Marianne And this is why Canada needs to seriously consider closing the border to all but essential travel to the USA. It's not Chinese socialized medicine we need to fear, it's a system that most can't afford to pay for.
23
The government will find a way to have mandatory quarantines and/or health checks, while weaseling out of paying for it. The result will be people NOT getting checked and spreading the virus.
This virus is a wakeup call in more ways than one.
First, how we handle a possible pandemic. We are "lucky" this one is relatively benign. The mortality rate COULD be 50 percent or higher (who knows what's thawing out as the ice melts).
Second, how is the US medical system working out? Is it truly in the best interest of public health to keep it the way it is? Or would a single payer system which covers everyone be better at keeping the population healthy?
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@rino What concerns me more is that not only will the government mandate such activities, it will resort to the private prison system (a la the detained immigrants) to facilitate the quarantine.
Where there is a buck to be made, these private companies will rush to put up tent cities everywhere.
And good luck finding medical care in such quarantines.
I would rather die in my own sputum than find myself in such a quarantine.
Dystopia is on our horizon.
A single payer program, advocated by PNHP, (Physicians for a National Health Program) with 15,000 physician members, will provide care for all in this country without regard to ability to pay.
Support it or you will regret not doing so.
118
@Touger ....."Physicians for a National Health Program - PNHP" I've checked their website. Needs publicity.
Before it can gain support, where is some talk about them in the media? Do they try to get on talk shows or write op eds? Why the blackout? Should be super newsworthy. Why don't Sanders and Warren mention them?
Strange!
The dead regret nothing.
Welcome to the mid-stages of the decline of medical care in the US related to for-profit medicine. As long as the republican cult is in charge of government there will be no change until the bodies are piling up, even then it will be difficult to change.
A Democrat, Max Baucus, would not let the public option into his Senate Committee on Finance during the initial ACA debates, so try not to get sick over the next couple of decades.
62
Max was a DINO and in the pocket of Big Pharma.
Mansion is another DINO, in the pocket of Coal ind.
3
@kirk
So Max Baucus is the reason we don’t have the public option? I thought Obama pulled it pre-emptively, hoping to win over some Republicans.
2
@kirk
Yes the pretend Democrats are as bad or worse than the Republicans... thanks for this. Mr. Baucus should be hounded out of the Democrat party.
And people wonder why people want Bernie...
2
Is it time for Medicare For All yet? Coronavirus is really making the case clear. I work in the service industry with many uninsured individuals (myself included) and know this could be the biggest downfall in the spread of the virus. We need all Americans to be insured once and for all!
120
Another testament to the wonders of the private insurance system which the likes of Biden, Buttigieg and Klobuchar insist Americans "love".
That so-called "progressives", are running against publicly financed universal health care is another landmark: this time to the power of insurance companies, the only jobs we're apparently afraid of losing.
44
@jrd It's not that they "love" their private insurance (well, I know some who do). A stunning number of Americans will resist any form of "government run insurance" because thirty plus years of Republicans pounding the concept of Reagan's "Nine Most Terrifying Words In The English Language" into the American psyche has worked.
1
One of my concerns is what will happen if (when?) someone who lives in a homeless camp contracts Covid-19. How can we get that person in to the hospital in the first place, and then how do we care for the wave of people who will almost inevitably follow?
60
The working poor and gig economy temp worker masses who lack any health insurance are in the exact same boat when it comes to avoiding seeking medical care. In fact, its well known that medical bills are a top cause of becoming destitute. Plus, low wage and gig workers are frequently disciplined or fired for calling in sick. Even if not fired, they get no income if they don’t show up to work sick.
6
@Melissa those people will not get to the hospital, and or/but will be left to die in tents outside the hospital.
You think a big chain hospital cooperation is going to admit 20+ people from a homeless camp site and put it's workers at risk? HA!
At most, some middle level provider will get sent to the camps to "help".
Nobody is going to put themselves at risk for that patient population willing.
3
I was shocked at how low the bill was--less than $4K? I was primed to see something like $40,000 at least and up to $400,000 would have been believable to me.
41
@Jay However, if you multiply $4k by, say, 30 days now you have $120,000.
That's more than twice the median income before taxes. It's more than most people have in their retirement funds.
4
The saddest part is, people are being told if they have flu-like symptoms, to go to the ER’s to be tested for COVID-19. Some are being turned away from testing because “as per protocol, their symptoms aren’t serious enough.” Just what IS serious enough? Pneumonia which may put people in critical condition? This just happened in downstate NY! That’s crazy! So, if this person happens to eventually develop more serious symptoms, and test positive after walking around for several days spreading it more, they’ll be criticized for not getting tested sooner?
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@LI RES Hopefully people will have some common sense and stay away from others if they develop any symptoms OR have had contact with infected or possibly infected people. Going to the ER to get tested also defies common sense. Stay home! Self quarantine. Jeez!
@LI RES
People believed to have Covid should NOT be going to ERs!!! The people with broken arms and chest pains do NOT want to be exposed to you.
This terrible lapse in the system needs to be addressed with dedicated temporary care sites (vacant buildings) run by healthcare workers in protective garb.
CRAZY to use the general ER! Then every person there goes back out into the community. What????
2
That's wrong all the way around. We have an obvious public health crisis and such punitive measures will only encourage people to under-report. The consequence? The disease will spread further and cause even greater suffering (and related costs).
This is what happens when social problems are addressed at the level of presumed individual responsibility. The first thing that the US government should be saying is - "Get yourself checked out now. You will not be charged for any subsequent treatment. We must all work together to stop this immediately as a collective problem."
This is like telling the residents of Hawaii following Pearl Harbor to assume the expense of purchasing their own rifle and rowboat.
47
I guess this article illustrates why Bernie Sanders is too radical a candidate for some of the commenters on the editorial page. If they are in the older age groups we might not have to read what they write in six months as they might be dead.moderate democratic peace.
14
America, land of the fee!!
May God bless universal healthcare.
My prayers and thoughts are with you.
62
So tell me, Should I seek medical attention if I suspect I am at risk and chance a $3000 or more bill. Most people simply cannot afford it. The fact that these bills were even sent out in the first place is a testament to the total incompetence of the CDC. They seem to be good at making mistakes.
27
@Allan it’s not the CDC, but the private health insurance nightmare of unnecessary complexity, duplication of effort, and, the guy assuming that since the government was mandating this, they were picking up the tab.
If you read the article, out-of-network charges, ambulance charges, and doctors who don’t accept his insurance all added to the costs - something that DOES NOT HAPPEN in nations with universal health care.
We’ve been duped into thinking we can’t have it here. We CAN, and SHOULD.
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@Allan
Please reread the article. The CDC did not send out the any of the bills.
You should know that in 2018 the Trump administration fired the government's entire pandemic response chain of command, including the White House management infrastructure. That year Trump also ordered the National Security Council's entire global health security unit shut down & cut CDC's global disease-fighting operational budget by 80%.
If you're going to point fingers, I would start there.
6
@Allan the CDC does not run healthcare in the country.
2
A gold rush is on for medical providers and big pharma. Vaccines could be coming for whatever the market will bear: $100, $250, $1K, $2K...? Expensive, yes, but perhaps cheaper than spending even 10 minutes at an emergency room.
13
If it happens to me, the government will pay- because I will refuse to be compliant in paying for services I was forced to recieve.
16
@Jason as the article stated, the patient forwarded the bills to a government email address that he was provided.
@Jason
Then, good luck continuing to function financially in our society with your ruined credit rating and mounting penalties and interest – – and ultimately maybe a judgment against your home or other property.
The power you imagine you have is only the power to self-harm.
2
I have to wonder what Trump's "Base" is going to start thinking. We are on the edge of a potential pandemic and medical insurance for a lot of Americans has be eliminated or severely cut back. The likelihood is that not only are many of these people going to get sick but they are also going to spread the infection. That puts "The Base" at risk and it isn't Democrats who did this and "The Base" will want to blame somebody.
Blocking people coming from Iran? The fact is countries where most of the people are white and christian are already seeing infections as are people who are both liberal and conservative.
The CDC's budget was cut and now we're scrambling. And the prominent voice is trying to blame everyone but himself for the problem.
Finally, the "Masters of the Universe" who run the stock markets are showing themselves to be Frightened Little Boys.
Where is the clear voice to lead us through this? It isn't in DC, that's for sure.
31
Wait -
Gostin is quoted as saying "There are legal, moral and public health reasons not to charge the patients."
Aren't there ALWAYS moral and public health reasons not to charge patients, particularly copious amounts of money, for medical care?? Do morals only matter sometimes? Should you pick and choose which conditions are deemed more worthy of treatment, based on how contagious they are?
51
@MJ You know health care is totally a privilege not a right, and a money making product. Morals never enter the picture.
2
@MJ " Should you pick and choose which conditions are deemed more worthy of treatment, based on how contagious they are?"
No, MJ, if you strip away the talk and platitudes, it begins to look like we pick and choose which people are worthy to live based on how much money they have. Because in America, your cash value is a demonstration of your human value, apparently.
Thank you, John Calvin, for the concept.
2
I cannot imagine it is ethical to hold them responsible for the bill. Additionally it is nonsensical to require an acute care hospital bed simply for quarantine, and a waste of resources. Some experts think we are past containment anyway and should focus on slowing the spread. Where mandatory quarantine fits in remains unclear.
14
I’ve been in the professional workforce for a few decades earning a very good salary. Now, I’m an hourly employee with a wage of $15/hour. My health insurance now is a vast improvement to my previous employment. My current employer pays half of my $1000 deductible. I can actually afford to see a physician now.
Regarding the Covid-19 virus; we are going to be in a world of hurt when this spreads throughout the population. The regular flu kills more, but this is a new virus and we really don’t know a whole lot about it’s actions like mutations. Uninsured people won’t seek medical treatment because of cost. No one should be denied treatment at an ER. Don’t risk your life and the lives of other because of money.
17
@Hello, It’s me! ER's cannot turn people away, but they are only required to fulfill two functions: assess and stabilize. They are not required to treat. If they cannot stabilize they arrange to transfer.
https://www.webmd.com/special-reports/er-violations/20181129/patients-rights-in-the-emergency-room
Most expats are given a choice on insurance, world wide coverage or world wide coverage excluding N. America. 6 years ago in Malaysia (was 64, male and in good health) I paid $1200 a month excluding N. America. To include N.A. coverage would have been $1700 a month.
Now married, living in China and am covered world wide under my wive's insurance.
23
@r shearr Yes, my expat son and his wife pay an extra $5000 a year to be covered in the US for the 3 weeks that they are here on home leave. Their NGO employers cover their health care everywhere else in the world.
3
In case of hospitals, the ratio of what they originally bill to what the insurance company pays them is generally three to one. For a four day stay, I was given a bill of about $38K and the insurance company promptly chopped it down to less than $14K. The insurance company paid what they decided was actually due - $14K - except for my deductible.
If I didn't have insurance, I'll still be billed $38K and will have to negotiate or more like plead with them to lower the bill. They'll lower the bill a little as favor and on condition I make some quick payments. But I would be lucky if I could get away with paying the double of what they had to accept from insurance company - no questions asked.
Unless well regulated this virus can be a real bonanza for many hospitals and those who help them collect their bills.
64
@DM , yes, people often think that we who have insurance “really pay” for the uninsured— But to the extent that this may be so, it’s not until the uninsured are refused helpful treatments, given second-rate care by many providers, hounded for payments, stripped of what little income they have, taken to court, handed to cruel collectors, driven bankrupt. And still punished after that. Many of them just don’t go in for care. It’s mighty depressing.
53
@DM I’ve always wondered why people don’t use Chapter 7 against the healthcare system more often.
2
@Bambam , there’s good reason people don’t. They can’t. Because it’s not a weapon to use against your creditors—it’s not like the bankruptcies that the rich or corporate class have available. Not like Trump’s, for example. For ordinary Americans, bankruptcy has been made into a poison pill, a torment and ineffective in providing relief, a killer of credit, and potentially of employment and housing. With plenty of demand against you left in place. This has been made deliberately so by the laws our “representatives” in government have made, at the behest of the bankers, credit companies, bought lobbyists, and wealth class.
2
Well this sure reinforces the case for Universal Health Coverage, Medicare for all with no deductibles, no co-pays and a compensatory tax increase to pay for this coverage. As Bernie states, it will be far less than premiums, deductibles, and co-pays we now deal with and that is if you have coverage, if you don’t, the average person will most likely go into debt or bankruptcy in the event of a illness or injury. The profits to Health Insurance Companies, Pharmaceutical Companies, and certain Medical Specialists that perform and bill Procedures could be defined as predatory capitalism. It is never enough for them. This needs to change in this Country for sure.
141
@Sschmidt
Bernie has not presented the figures to back up what he claims. The compensatory tax increase would have to be staggering.
3
@DJS
Not necessarily; I have Medicare @ $103/mo. Basic coverage, and a supplemental Plan I pay from an annuity purchased from 401K savings. My taxes have not increased. Business would benefit, especially small 50 or fewer who might now be able to offer coverage. Large multi-State corporations would benefit. General good health for all would be a good thing, in view of the current illness sweeping the world. It does not benefit us to have sick people waiting at the border, or crossing at hidden points of entry. My grandmother remembered the flu in 1918 which filled the local Armory in SF. If people are refused care, they will find ways to cross the border, possibly carrying the virus. I went to H.S. with kids crippled from Polio before the Salk vaccine. Crippling illness and disease threatens all; treatment is better than a pandemic.
50
@Sschmidt
Are you dreaming? Even medicare patients are not covered completely and need to buy gap insurance. Even the countries which Sanders keep on mentioning as having free healthcare require that the patients pay a copayment some cover only 70% but then their medical care is a lot less to begin with. Seems their healthcare providers are not as greedy as ours and their medications cost far less . No deductible! image we will be going to the doctors for the slightest thing. And don't discount the fraud that will be going on and the unnecessary tests that are already occurring with Medicare and Medicaid.
11
Of course I share the feelings of all these folks about medical bills. I am 80 and my diabetic cat costs me more than I spend on Rx copays, which is the ONLY thing I pay.
What I am actually writing about is, I wonder if most other people reading these stories are as surprised as I am to keep reading of the large number of US citizens living all over China? Sounds like it must be thousands!
17
@caharper I completely agree. I had a cat who was diabetic (he passed away in 2018) and his insulin alone was $150. It's insane what people are paying for medical care & prescriptions in this country. Something needs to change it's not right.
10
@caharper
But do you realize how many Chinese (not Chinese Americans born in this country)are living here especially enrolled at public high school so they can attend our universities as residents and state funded universities.
UC San Diego has a 19% Chinese student enrollment, all Chinese citizens. This takes places away from about 12K Californian students and this is only one tax payer supported university in California. It is cheaper and easier for them to get their educations here, less competition.
Talk about thousands and these are certainly not poor folks, they are from the wealthiest class of Chinese citizens.
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@Vail without full-pay Chinese students, many colleges would be closing their doors. I think most Californians would prefer UC San Diego continue that practice over higher taxes or reducing departments.
He was given a government email contact whereby medical bills relating to the quarantine are to be sent. It’s not clear as to if he has not yet forwarded the bills or if he’s waiting to hear back regarding these bills. Unless the government refuses to pay this is much ado about nothing.
10
@Elizabeth
Exactly. Hopefully he sent them all the bills he received related to the quarantine. And its not helpful to ask them questions about who pays what since he already received instructions on that. Just send them the bills as requested. Providing too much information or asking for information that has already been provided will only confuse the matter and delay resolution. When the government says send me the bills we will pay, then that is what you do, no more no less.
3
It stated clearly in the article that he emailed the contact and had not heard back.
1
While a terrible additional stress for this family, I’m glad that the unfair and deleterious effect of privatized health insurance is being shown in such a dramatic way. It’s clearly not good for the out of luck individual, but jeopardizes all of us because it discourages seeking treatment even in a pandemic.
68
Don't pay. Refuse to pay. Challenge any attempts by the government to collect. If all who are forced into isolation protest in this manner the government will either have to take drastic action which will make the government look bad or they can just give up. If there are enough victims and they all do the same thing the government will be forced to help the peopl.
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@Max Deitenbeck
It's a nice strategy in theory but in practice, it is likely to end up with a collection agency and bad credit rating.
35
@Max Deitenbeck refusing to pay can have serious repercussions on your credit, or real estate if you own any. For instance, the hospital can go to court and obtain a judgment for the collection, then encumber your property with a lien. If the creditor finds out where your other assets are too - to include non retirement investments, mutual funds, stocks, saving and checking accounts - all these can be taken with the judgment to collect the amount. All the creditor has to do is present the judgment it to your bank and those funds are transferred to the creditor.
18
@Max I've unfortunately tried that & as others have said the biller ended up going to court and getting a judgment against me. I filled for bankruptcy 3 months later. You can't get out of paying medical bills without severe damage to your credit which then affects everything you purchase for the next several years.
27
If being a citizen of this country is to mean anything, returning home and being held in quarantine to protect everyone else should not result in thousands of dollars of bills for doing the right thing. The person in question returned voluntarily also to accompany his three year old daughter, who is an American citizen. If we as a society want people to do the right thing, we shouldn't punish them for doing so by sending them a large bill. If word of such billing gets out (it is now), how many will try to avoid quarantine just because they are worried about the costs? Even one is one too many!
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@Pete in Downtown All persons incarcerated in America are the “wards of the state” which means that their healthcare costs are the responsibility of the State. So should all persons quarantined or hospitalized by the State. During an epidemic, the ONLY way to guarantee compliance with Health policies is to provide for the costs on their “confinement”. So far the Coronavirus has cost stock holders $6 Trillion. Can we afford to pay for healthcare? Can we afford to deny universal healthcare? Should Defense dollars be dedicated to funding our health? Is healthcare a National defense priority? Why not?
8
Yes we are definitely shooting ourselves in the foot here.
2
For some reason, I keep thinking there is a national-level politician who has been arguing for YEARS that health care is a human right, and that we need a Medicare for All system. Oh, yes--his name is Bernie Sanders. Say what you want about Bernie, but he's right on this--and we should have listened long before now.
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@Kim Scipes
The Medicare for All plan fails to take into account that provider participation in Medicare is optional, that the government has been whittling away at providers' compensation rates to ridiculously low rates such that increasing numbers of providers have opted out, and that Medicare for All is predicated on the erroneous belief that that those doctors who have not opted out are going to agree to have their incomes slashed further.
Proponents of Medicare for All are asking doctors to accept pay cuts which the proponents would never accept.
Bernie Sanders is a millionaire who likes to trash billionaires. He can no longer trash millionaires now that he is one.
How much of his OWN money has Bernie Sanders spent on the medical care of Americans who can't afford medical care.? Any ?!
Elizabeth Warren is a millionaire. How much of HER own money has she spent to help Americans who are in need.
What about Barck Obama ? I recall that he was considering buying a summer home on Martha's Vineyard that cost something like 15 million dollars. That money would pay for medical care, food, & shelter for Americans in need.
These politicians talk a good game, but they aren't put THEIR money where their mouths are.
1
@DJS Nor should they. This isn't about my wanting Warren or Sanders or even President Obama to come riding to my rescue when I am sick. I shouldn't be a charity or a go fund me project.
A National Health Insurance based on some workable model such as German, Scandanavian countries, England, Canada and paid for by taxes on all people and those ultra wealthy companies that pay zero taxes currently makes more sense than the insanity we now have. I have dental insurance which I purchase from my former employer. Nonetheless I was out of pocket by $1200 for a crown and some periodontal work. I won't be continuing the periodontal work as I simply can't afford it.
6
He chose to return to the US. He voluntarily incurred those fees when he chose to leave China. He should cover his expenses just like the rest of us do wen we are not covered. Also, even if we had some single payer system, as a non resident, he would not likely be covered as countries that do offer universal health care generally have a 30 to 90 day residency period before benefits eligibility occurs.
6
You are missing the bigger point here. Someone is getting billed following a mandatory quarantine order and various tests mandated by the government.
If tomorrow you are quarantined the bills will come your way. There is not a lot your employer insurance will do for you given you will have little say in what happens.
A disincentive to check on symptoms is a societal problem not an individual one because in the end it benefits no one.
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@Steve And was he voluntarily told about those fees? No.
Plus, as the article had mentioned, fees may discourage anyone seeking help, which could make matters worse.
124
@Steve I broke my ankle while on vacation in The Netherlands. As a non-EU citizen, I was charged their private-pay flat fee for an ER visit, which was 300 euros. This was less than my deductible for an ER visit in this country with BCBS insurance. No other charges were incurred, not even a charge for crutches.
242
A provision in the ACA says health insurance companies must cover federally mandated vaccines. Having said that, this pandemic will hurt the poor and uninsured terribly.
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@Laura Reich When I went to my clinic to get a flu shot, I found out that even though the cost of the vaccine was covered, I was still going to be held responsible for the clinic visit co-payment- about $150.00. So I went to the local pharmacy, where I was told that my insurance was refusing to pay for the shot since now I was using an out of service area provider. I still got the vaccine at the pharmacy, since they only charged $49.00. The final insult is that my insurance was through my RN husband's employer- a large Catholic health care organization.
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@Malinoismom The flu vaccine in France is free for over 65 year olds. Under that age it costs 5 euro after the governmental health system. Anyone French or not can buy the vaccine in any pharmacy for 10 euro, the pharmacist will give you the shot for free. Why, you might ask, here they think prevention is cheaper than treatment and they want to keep flu victims, rich or not, to a minimum.
13
Trump would see that as a feature not a bug
If the epidemic gets bad enough, it may bankrupt all the health insurers and the hospitals. Then the government may be forced to take them over. So maybe the epidemic will leave behind a single payer system.
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@Rahul. Unfortunately, the US managed to avoid a single payer system even in times of other large epidemics with often fatal outcomes. That being said, a truly epic pandemic like the Spanish flu might push the current system into the dustbin of history where it belongs.
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@Pete in Downtown
I don't think the US healthcare system has ever been tested by a true black swan event. The victims of the AIDS epidemic and the narcotics epidemic were mostly uninsured and also slow moving so the hospitals and the insurers had the time to move costs back to the employers, patients and the government. This is a fast moving epidemic, with astronomical costs where the victims may be mostly insured and the providers and the insurers may not have the opportunity to move the cost to someone else. Also, the government will force the hospitals to treat the uninsured and the undocumented, otherwise they will become a public liability.
31
A lethal virus will save us.
How much more evidence is it going to take for the U.S. to adopt a similar universal health system found in every other developed nation?
What about private insurance 'co-pays'? How many mild to moderate cases are going to wait out their recovery instead of getting tested and contact traced?
The epidemiological consequences of a for profit system are adding up. Excellent care at the highest price and reduced pubic health outcomes overall.
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@GR The care is not always so excellent. Exclusions, outrageous co-pays, and high premiums, including insurance companies who refuse and then fight for a year and finally deny on their own authority because they own the "arbitration," just like banks and financial services do. Not excellent.
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@marek pyka. I believe he meant excellent health care for those who have "Cadillac" level health insurance or are really wealthy (the top 5 %), but bad overall health outcomes for most. The other thing with infectious diseases is that they don't stop at the outside of gated communities. Viruses and other bugs are the ultimate equalizer, and can affect rich and poor alike.
58
This might be what finally breaks the American health care system. If lots of Americans get hit with huge medical bills due to the coronavirus, there might be widespread calls for change. Not overly hopeful. But maybe.
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@Julie No, "widespread calls" do nothing. One has first to outbid the opposing, "pre-paid" lobbyists and party, then provide assurances after the legislative member and administration official who breaks ranks is subsequently fired or black-balled.
4
@Julie, if say a few hundred thousand Americans or more get hit with these types of medical bills many of them will file for bankruptcy. I sure the heck would. If I get zapped with a huge bill not covered by Medicare and my supplemental health insurance policy there is no way I'm forking over whatever money I have to live on in my IRA for the next possibly 20 years. My home is owned by an Irrevocable Trust. Imagine what will happen to the Federal Court system with all these bankruptcies clogged to the max.
3
Millions of Americans can’t afford medical bills, so won’t seek medical care until they’re on death’s door. Many of those same people can’t afford to take unpaid leave, so will just continue going in to work. A disproportionate percentage of these people work in service sector jobs that have frequent contact with the public. This is a recipe for disaster.
1132
Exactly! I have two service industry jobs, neither of which pays well or comes with health insurance or sick leave. I get two personal days a year. That is going to be completely inadequate if I get sick with this. Nobody gets over corona virus in two days I will be faced with going to work sick or not being able to pay my bills, because the paychecks stop when I don’t work. And there are millions more people just like me. What exactly are we supposed to do? If we do the right thing we are going to face serious financial hardship.
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@Smilodon7
Wear a mask at the first sign of a cold. But that is almost impossible due to the shortage of masks in the US.
6
@Alex the holy trinity, president trump, Pastor Pence and Jesus will all pray and the virus will magically dissappear, by April.
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There's nothing like a looming pandemic to lay bare the unsustainable, profiteering US healthcare system. Where else would a significant chunk of the citizenry avoid the hospital due to fear of costs? Mr Wuckinski's coronavirus bill story will be one of many. The first I read was last week, when a Miami man with covid-19 symptoms did the right thing, went to the hospital, and found himself with a $3200 bill.
To me at least, it's unfathomable we allow for-profit health insurance to dominate the entire country. Why do we discourage people to seek preventative treatment? Why is anyone okay with the in-network/out of network patchwork system that leads to thousands of medical bankruptcies and early deaths annually? Do people realize how much less stressful life would be with a universal health insurance system?
I'm amazed that the underinsured US has dodged pandemics for so long. It's our moral imperative to use this moment to demand Medicare for All, now.
864
@Ted B I couldn't agree more. I keep telling my coworkers that this is a horrible shock we'll have to endure together. And it will have to be bad enough that we'll finally cave in and drop our truly absurd healthcare system.
8
@Ted B You really have to ask "why"? You've never had to live under mob "protection," it's really much the same thing.
@Ted B The U.S. for a long time was able to avoid issues because it had a strong regulatory regimen: FDA, EPA, CDC, NIH. These organizations prevent contaminants making it into our food, medicine, air/water and retail locations. And, if something does happen, they coordinate the efforts to clean it up and fine companies that fail to do their due diligence.
This is WHY the U.S. has managed to avoid a whole list of problems that other countries have had. But now, the idiots are busy dismantling the system so things are starting to slip in. The longer that this occurs, the greater the chance something serious will happen.
Perhaps this episode is the one.
3
When people without good insurance coverage get wind of the notion that getting caught up in a quarantine might cost them tens of thousands of dollars, the US will have a significant number of residents working in the service industry who understand they MUST evade testing and quarantine. And who could blame them? It would be virtually instant bankruptcy. I'm sure that won't affect the spread of COVID-19. Or perhaps the Trump administration, ever perceptive of the plight of the working poor, the uninsured, and the undocumented, will see the danger and convincingly address the problem.
Yet another way that America's health care system fails all Americans.
543
Most service industry workers have little in the way of an emergency fund.
13
@Bounds I'm sorry, but I actually got a good laugh while reading your comment on this increasingly grim situation. When "the Trump administration, ever perceptive of the plight of the working poor, the uninsured, and the undocumented, will see the danger and convincingly address the problem.", I burst into laughter.
Okay, back to reality. Thanks for the morning lift, anyway.
8
@Bounds ... Wikipedia— “Paid sick leave is a statutory requirement in most European, many Latin American, a few African and Asian countries…”
W. Post … “ Per BLS statistics, 28 percent of U.S. civilian workers — about 45 million — have no access to paid sick leave.”
And millions no insurance.
What happened in past epidemics?
But what happened with previous epidemics of viruses.
6
The UK has made some spectacularly bad decisions in the past few years but at least remains united in protecting its national health service. The news comment here at present is all around how with the national health service cope with a pandemic; the notion that citizens could be bankrupted by it just isn't part of the conversation. That additional psychological burden is unthinkable over here and US resistance to universal health care completely incomprehensible.
384
@William, the US "resistance" isn't from most of the populace except those who fall for the propaganda from the health insurance companies and allegedly "non-profit" mega corporations that own a majority of the hospital systems and control the level of enrollment and requirements for qualifications for medical schools, etc. in our country. It's all rigged to stuff their pockets with cash and make sick people and/or their families or their Estates if they die pay for outrageous bills for medical care. Meanwhile, millionaires whom I had the unfortunate experience of having to work with in estate planning before I retired were able to pay for the establishment of Trusts that would provide for "incidentals" for any disabled dependents whom they then kicked to the curb at age 18 and as a disabled adult would qualify for Medicaid. Their health care, nursing home and/or instutitionalized care were all paid for courtesy of Wisconsin and Federal taxpayers, NOT the extremely wealthy parents.
68
@William , they’re after you though, make no mistake. Trump will help “save” the British markets from Brexit failures, but he and his corpo pals will want their rewards for it. Yes, they’re after you and they just keep coming back. Good luck, truly.
7
@Jan N YES! I am more than ready for a single payer system!
Ordinary people are being put between a rock and a hard place because of health insurance. Afraid to incur costs to check if they even have Coronavirus, and sadly, left in a position where they may infect others.
Living in the UK with the NHS, I'm just devastated for anyone in the US feeling so helpless.
This is the richest country on Earth. It's staggering.
Of course, I don't believe the NHS can necessarily prevent a pandemic - but I have every incentive and opportunity to make sure I'm not a threat to others if I have the misfortune to contract Coronavirus, by getting myself checked.
282
@J, this is the richest country on earth for 1% of the population. Eighty percent of us aren't doing so well or are barely keeping our heads above water, and 19% who make between $100,000 to $950,000 a year work for the 1% in some capacity or other.
82
@J You know, if you think about it, this isn't the richest country on earth. Maybe it has the most rich people of any country, and many of the richest people in the world, but if you measure the quality of life of 75 or 80 % of the population in terms of universal access to health care, sick leave, parental leave, mandatory vacation, subsidized higher education, first-rate public transportation, national old-age pensions that people can live on, access to parks, beaches, forests and other amenities, we are pretty far down the list. If we lack these things many Europeans and others take for granted, plus see countries like Cuba beating us on infant mortality (look it up), it's just not true. We can't be the richest country in the world.
Also, this is not a civilized country. My standard for civilization is no capital punishment, universal health care as a right and sensible gun control. Three strikes and we're out.
129
@J
Don't you know that a plan like the NHS is communistic. At least that's what we hear when people attack Bernie Sanders for proposing the U.S. equivalency.
I'm sure it would surprise everyone in the UK that Boris Johnson is a communist just like Sanders purported to be by his opponents.
4
Our lack of a cost effective universal healthcare system make us particularly vulnerable right now. We the people may not fair to well with the Coronavirus but I'm pretty sure the private insurance companies will do just fine.
409
@Mike B
I would feel more vulnerable in a place like Great Britain where the government has come right out and said they will be rationing care for those that are believed to have the best chance at recovery. I don’t want the government deciding if I’m worthy of medical care even if it means I’ll get a bill.
4
@Elizabeth all medical care is rationed whether you realize it or not. Rationing comes in many forms, to include refusing to reimburse doctors, long waits, turning down treatment plans or medication and on and on. This happens regardless of whether you have government or private insurance. No one gets everything - well, except maybe the cash paying customer with unlimited funds.
62
So, your for profit insurance company will be deciding if you deserve care. Feel better? You shouldn’t. They make more when they delay and deny care.
44
This is why we need health insurance for all citizens. I can’t understand how in the United States we have to insure the vehicles we drive, yet insuring our bodies is optional? Aren’t the people worth more than vehicles? Private insurance options are unaffordable to those who don’t get medical insurance through their employer. The system has been broken for too long. Medicate for all is a necessity!
321
@Tanya S Not health _insurance_ per se but _universal_ and _affordable_ health care. Many countries do this perfectly well without a mostly insurance-based system — mostly through price controls and a combination of nonprofit insurance providers (see Germany), government health care (NHS), or a combination thereof.
5
@Tanya S, even insurance provided through an employer can be extremely expensive, especially if you make $40K or less a year. I have a friend who makes around $40K a year and she is only offered the option of either a very expensive plan that she can't afford to pay the premium on or a high deductible plan with a deductible for a single person of $6,500 a year! It's ridiculous and disgusting.
3
@Tanya S
Healthcare should be provided to all Americans. Forcing middle class people, who are often on a tight budget to purchase insurance is good for the healthcare industry but not for individuals.
2
Like our friends in Canada we have here in Australia universal health scheme - Medicare which covers all emergency medical care funded out of federal taxation. Total expenditure on medical systems in Australia costs half what it costs in the US for an equivalent world-class service at half of the cost of the grossly inefficient US medical system.
The difference is reportedly the gouging by the US medical professionals in both hospitals and in medical practice
472
@Whistleblower
The biggest difference is the amount on top of patient care that goes to profits and marketing and administration and lavish executive compensation packages in the insurance and pharmaceutical companies.
Yes, there is price gouging also by hospitals and practitioners, but it is small compared the really bad actors listed above.
90
@Whistleblower
No. Medical professionals are not gouging.
Medical professionals in the United States are being compensated so poorly such that they have been advising their children against becoming M.Ds. for decades.
Electricians , plumbers, contractors and individuals who work in any number of professions that do not require
completing a grueling pre-med and medical school education, followed by 3+ years of residency, often followed by fellowships before those workers go on to make far more money that do medical doctors.
45
@Whistleblower
I’ve lived in Canada. The healthcare was a nightmare. I was endlessly driving back to the United States for care. Their hospitals stuck four people in a tiny room and the wait time for an mri was over a year.
3
The coronavirus crisis has thrown into relief just how much
America needs Medicare for all.
This crisis may or may not resolve itself in time, but we'll surely be faced with others. Any such development requires a safety net of
largely free, readily available medical care for all citizens.
And we'll need to evaluate whether the greater good is served by offering the same care to non-citizens. and to what extent the country can afford to do that.
Go Bernie!
285
@Cool Cat Medicare as well as personal private option.
3
@Cool Cat "to what extent the country can afford to do that".
America could well afford that. In Britain, even before our National Health Service started we had Trade Unions who organised a similar service for their members and families. As a young apprentice in 1946 I got mumps so I went to the doctor who advised me to stay at home for a week and gave me a sick certificate. Employers were also more considerate of employees than seem normal in USA as I did not lose pay for that week.
Now the NHS gives even better coverage for everyone for half as much per person in taxes as those Americans who can afford it pay for partial coverage.
6
@Cool Cat
There also needs to be a National basic income so that those sick can afford to stay home and go to the hospital. Yang is correct.
2
Given the details of this story, it's amazing to me that so many Americans are still resistance to the idea of "medicare for all" - ie what we have here in Canada. The number that really stood out for me is that a day spent in hospital in the US is 10 times that of Spain. What is that all about?
957
@George
Thanks for your comment - I think it’s important to encourage people in other countries with affordable universal healthcare systems to post their positive experiences and support for it.
I think that would help cut through some of the misunderstanding and anxiety over changing it from our own currently awful system to something much saner and better for all.
202
@George The medical profession in the US wants as much money as it can extract from its customers. I get the impression they have finally figured out in the last decade that they can charge anything that they want, and garnish wages, jail or bankrupt anyone who can't pay.
155
Unfortunately in the US, our healthcare is managed by private for profit companies. The only ones who win are the CEO’s at the top who collect the profits. If you have insurance through your employer you are lucky, if you have no insurance it’s unaffordable to most. I really feel that politicians in our country could care less about the citizens. And the problem is very politically divided amongst the population. So nothing changes and people die unnecessarily.
41
Minutes before reading this article, I received an unexpected bill from Kaiser. I'd had to have my eyes examined because a newer medication I've taken for 5 years has been found to cause blindness in a significant percentage of patients. I don't have good eye coverage (no on glasses; yes on regular exam) but was assured that because doctor ordered that it'd be covered. Then today get notice of $213 bill.
In January I had to deal with my subsidy getting dropped due to a glitch & was a terrifying hassle getting it reinstated -- and now waiting on appeal to have the extra $400 had to pay for 3 weeks w/o subsidy put toward my premium.
Health insurance is a nightmare and a joke in this country. It can't change soon enough. The example here regarding novel virus quarantine is just especially egregious and obscene.
1008
@Winky
For-profit insurance will always try to pull this mess if they can get away with it. Always.
If you are afraid of Medicare For All, if you buy the line that everyone is afraid of losing their for-profit insurance, just ask yourself this:
Have you EVER heard of ANYONE who was 64 complaining that they were about to lose their wonderful insurance?
EVER?
Mic drop.
111
@Winky You know that in Sweden full coverage, everything, all the time, for as long as needed, cost a maximum of 400 US dollars per every 12 months. Nothing if you're not sick, and 18 US per doctor visit. Comes really handy when dealing with emergencies like Coronavirus, you appreciate paying the higher taxes for the peace of mind..
126
@Nathan Hansard
Kaiser is a nonprofit health insurer, mostly West Coast. Many insurers were once nonprofit mutuals. Remember how states allowed all the BCBS plans to become for-profits. Even recently, Fidelis was sold off to a for-profit.
Traditional Medicare covers only 80% of costs, so you need to buy gap insurance on top of your actual Medicare premiums. Medicare is great because insurance for the elderly otherwise wouldn’t exist, because they’re so likely to have costly illnesses. They’re otherwise uninsurable.
M4A isn’t Medicare. It’s a single payer plan that bans private health insurance, including nonprofits, union plans, self insured company plans, etc. It’s the federal government taking over the entire health insurance sector, deciding what care is paid for and how much.
Whatever system we have, people will complain about something. In the U.K., the NHS is free but there are healthcare worker shortages and waiting periods. They won’t even cover some new drugs. There is no utopian healthcare system. There are always tradeoffs.
12
Is the coronavirus spreading because people without insurance are afraid to come forward for testing? Are big bills what the future holds for all Americans? Is universal health care the logical solution?
614
The Coronavirus has already spread and is continuing to spread and the numbers are so low because of low testing! And I agree that people without insurance will not go to the emergency room...so we are lost either way.
111
@Zev
To answer your last question: Yes, universal health care is the logical solution.
The average American cannot afford a $400 emergency; there's no way the average American can absorb $5000 in unplanned medical bills.
In the case of Mr Wucinski, his employer coverage only worked in China, where he lived. He was quarantined in California but presumably is from Pennsylvania. So, even if he had US coverage out of PA, any doctors or facilities in CA would be out of network and either not covered at all, or very minimally covered.
Two combined disasters could bring this country down: coronavirus, and the medical bills from coronavirus.
82
Of course it is, but since when did we as a nation make logical decisions?
35
And we wonder why the Coronavirus could be so much worse in the US than elsewhere.
Our government is telling us that it's a common cold - the mortality rate is "only" 2%, far less than MERS or SARS (also Coronaviruses). Indeed - there were, worldwide, roughly 10,000 cases of MERS *and* SARS that killed roughly 3,000 - a 30% death rate. COVID 19 cases now number around 80,000, the number dead is roughly 1,600, about half the number of deaths due to MERS and SARS.
Given that we are at the start of what could be a pandemic, we could be in for a world of hurt. Thank heavens our so-called president is worried about our 401k's and "his" stock market. I would hate to lose money when we could see as many as 20,000 - and it could be significantly more - die.
This does not consider the financial costs with the surprise bills described by Ms. Kliff.
Don't know about y'all, but I'm taking my money out of stocks and putting it in bonds; except for stock in medical supplies and hand sanitizers. Trust me, I'll be going through a lot of that.
131
@Peter Hornbein
The number dead is actually roughly 3,000. Not sure where you're getting your statistics, but you can check the W.H.O. website yourself. Of course this is all based on incomplete data, but if you're going to bring up statistics and death rate, please make sure you're using the right numbers.
While I appreciate that you were trying to provide some insight with your comment, posting completely incorrect information is not the way to do it. 41 people have already recommended your comment despite the figure you cited being undeniably wrong.
7
@Peter Hornbein
Good luck finding medical supplies and hand sanitizer. There are no N-95 masks, other masks, or hand sanitizers available . Vendors are advertising Purell for $100.
There are no N-95 masks available for any amount of money.
2
@Peter Hornbein
If you believe the best time to take money out of stocks is on the downturn, perhaps you shouldn't have been in the market in the first place. The time to have sold if you felt the need to was when it was at record highs.
13