Friday Peace Vigil, Youngstown, OH, and surrounding area:

PEACE VIGIL
YOUNGSTOWN, OH
Friday, November 2, 2012
4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Downtown on the Square (Federal Plaza E. & Wick Ave.)

Ray Nakley (330-506-1999) and Ron Dull (330-518-9881) will hold their weekly Peace Vigil this Friday, November 2, from 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m., at the corner of Downtown on the Square (Federal Plaza E. & Wick Ave.), Youngstown, OH. They invite anyone who is interested in showing their support for ending conflict in the world to join them. Hold out positive thoughts for that!

　

This week:
　

This week I’ve been reasonably productive, but I have a couple more life things to get through before I can get back to writing on my novel. Maybe by next week. We’ll see. Meanwhile, this week I had an all-important annual medical test, and we took care of our semi-annual civic duty.

VITAL MEDICAL TASK
Today I crossed my mammogram off my to-do list. Or as I like to call it, my annual ritual of booby-smooshing. My mother and her mother had breast cancer, both when they were past the age of 70, and I’m fast approaching that milestone. I make a point of keeping a close eye on ‘the girls,’ just to catch any trouble so I can deal with it swiftly and effectively.

As an old registered nurse who began practicing before World War I, Grandma was not a fan of ‘old school’ doctors, so she didn’t go for help when she first discovered a lump. Once she began receiving medical treatment, at my mother’s urging, it was much too late, and she eventually succumbed to the disease.

That’s why her daughter, my mother, was so diligent about going for treatment the moment she discovered a lump in her breast. As a result, she had a simple lumpectomy. The cancer was so small and contained at that point that she didn’t need any further cancer treatment for the rest of her life, nearly 20 more years. With all the other medical complications I have to deal with, I have to be as diligent as she was. Which makes me think of the other vital task Jim and I both took care of during the past week.

VITAL CIVIC TASK
We voted. We filled in our early ballots and put them into the mail in plenty of time so they will be counted. I’m proud to say we both voted for Barack Obama and Joe Biden for President and Vice President. We also voted for the Democratic candidates for the other state and national offices, especially Rich Carmona for Arizona’s second Senator, and the return of Ann Kirkpatrick to the House of Representatives, where she belongs.

The reason it’s so important to keep the current administration in the White House, the Democratic majority in the Senate, and to bring the Democrats back into control of the House is that the Medical Care Act must be preserved and improved. This momentous victory for President Obama is one of the most important and moral laws the United States has implemented in decades.

Although so-called Obamacare isn’t quite the universal coverage that must be the eventual goal everywhere in the world, it is a vast improvement over the old system in which profit-greedy insurance corporations held the power of life and death over people who paid them for health insurance coverage and then were denied payment for necessary medical care. To say nothing of the millions of people who couldn’t even afford any kind of medical insurance and were even denied access to state Medicaid benefits.

If the Republicans win this election and gain control of the Executive and/or Legislative reins of the country, there is every reason to fear that they will dismantle the system that allows most Americans to have access to necessary medical care. That means insurance benefits will be further gutted, medical costs will continue to skyrocket, and tens of millions of people will become disabled and sickly from conditions that could easily have been prevented with timely intervention.

The cheapest and most effective health care systems in the world are the ones that provide care for everyone that needs it, when they need it, paid for through a single payer. Why the GOP can’t understand that is beyond me. But they will not be distracted from their reverence to the ‘religion’ of filthy profits bled from human misery.

And they have the audacity to call socialized medicine ‘immoral.’

Positive thoughts and, for those who are believers, prayers for all the suffering souls all around the world!

Repeal Obamacare? Over my dead body!

Actually, in the title above I reversed the order of potential events. A recent battle convinced me this dire prediction isn’t out of the realm of possibility, but I’m getting ahead of myself. First, the back story:

I’m sick. Really sick. I’ve dealt with serious illness all my life. I don’t usually mention it, except when it comes up naturally in conversation, I need accommodation for my condition, or it’s relevant to my writing about the economic necessity for the country to provide comprehensive and preventive health care for everyone without exception.

My experience shows the profit-driven medical industry is irreparably broken. That’s why I’m sharing this account of my latest conflict with Big Business. The problem occurred because of two factors:

• The few drugs I take are vital for my survival. Previously, doctors gave me other drugs, but serious reactions proved I’m taking the best, safest drugs for my combination of conditions.
• I have an extreme allergy to the chemical food dyes--red, yellow, blue, green--that make pills pretty. Two years ago, I took two colored pills one at a time almost two months apart and landed in ICU for two days.

That’s why I’m so careful about drugs. No pretty pills. One drug comes in capsules, but I transfer it to clear gelatin capsules purchased separately. The process is tedious, but it beats ICU.

My sensitivity began gradually years ago until it became life-threatening. I’m well aware another exposure could send me straight to that windowless basement room with refrigerated compartments. That’s why I’ll never eat another bite of food or take another pill that’s pretty enough to die for.

Meanwhile, drug companies are cutting product lines, so it’s hard to find certain medications; insurance companies designate where clients can purchase drugs; and people like me get caught in the vise. Two months ago our designated mail-order supplier (which I’ll call MO, for convenience) informed me generic capsules were unavailable and my “choices” were pretty-colored tablets. When I explained tablets are verboten, I was told to find a source myself.

I contacted the manufacturer that produces the brand drug in capsule form. When I called MO back, I learned they only buy drugs through authorized suppliers. No exceptions. After two months they finally said my local pharmacy could order the brand drug, but when my drug store did that, MO denied payment.

Then someone at MO sent me a bottle of pretty blue pills! My initial reaction was that they were so tired of hearing my complaints, they wanted me to take the pills and die! Then they wouldn’t have to hear from me again.

When I called MO about it, I mentioned the “poison” pills often. Finally, MO said my local pharmacy could request an override of the payment denial. Finally! Of course, now I have to pay five times as much each month as I used to pay every three months. Meanwhile, MO did charge for those poison pills, and they’ve made no attempt to pay it back or credit our account.

But there’s a bright light ahead. My husband is retiring soon. Medicare and supplemental policies allow greater choice, including our local pharmacy’s mail-order service. They were our provider several years ago, and their customer service is superb. We can’t wait.

This experience demonstrates two vital points:

• Just as with all battles I’ve had to wage to obtain diagnoses and care, the time and energy I spent on this quest for a simple but necessary treatment has made me sicker and kept me from doing my real work.
• The only way to correct our fractured medical industry is to establish a universal single-payer health care system in which anyone may choose any provider and all providers must adhere to a national standard of care and serve each individual’s medical needs.

If I hadn’t had to spend so much time and energy researching, educating, and fighting for every little thing I needed for my care over the years, I wouldn’t be as sick as I am today. And my experiences are not unique. Numerous reports indicate this kind of thing, and worse, occurs to thousands of people all over the country.

We must stop wasting human resources and start helping everyone enjoy the most productive lives possible. Instead of repealing Obamacare, Congress should improve it and expand coverage to everyone in the country.