Afford to Live

At the urging of a friend, I just watched 4 news videos making up an hour of Keith Olbermann speaking to America about Health Care. He did it so well. It brought me to anger, to wanting to scream, to brimming tears and to resolution. To the resolution that there should never be a health care system that ones ability to stave off death for 5 years, 5 hours or 5 minutes is based on what a person can afford. To the resolution that this is not about politics it is about DEATH. I am dying, you are dying, we all are dying and although it may not be today, it will come. Should we or should you support a system where how long you live depends on what you can afford?! Olbermann lays out his case eloquently, emotionally and it is heart wrenching and mind boggling that the American public cannot see who the real enemy is that threatens their lives. It is not Doctors, Nurses, Pharmacists or for that matter disease. It is Insurance companies. Without insurance, you have a 43% higher chance of death sooner than those insured. A person who used to smoke but quit, only has a 42% chance of dying sooner than someone who never smoked. Your risks without insurance are greater than if you once smoked! Olbermann points out that that gap of life expectancy is widening by 1% per year. In 1843 in the year of Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol" there was a 53% chance of early death, In 2014 in this country we call our own, the land of the American dream, those without insurance will have a 53% chance of dying sooner than those insured. Are we doomed to return to the world of Charles Dickens here in America?


I tried to write the following quote down accurately and I apologize if I mad any error in it but here it is: "Then there are the bills. How does one heal? How does one fight a cancer when you are lying in a hospital bed and the sound of the meter is running so loudly, you can hear it?"


For some 40 million Americans that have no insurance death waits, because they cannot afford insurance. Death is the issue and no other. It is death that at 63 years of age creeps ever closer. Whatever the argument, whatever the argued numbers of uninsured are, it is still MILLIONS. Can we afford it?

The links for each segment of Keith Olbermann's complete show on Health Care are below. PLEASE take the time to watch it in its entirety. I would rather have this shown in the schools than even a Presidential video. It is more important because there is nothing more important than life.


(1) Saving American Lives: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33217219
(2) A wake-up call to Washington: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33217592
(3) Respecting pain and patient: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33217446
(4) Companies betting on employee's lives: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33217346
(5) America's widening health gap: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33217296