I Watched My Patients Die of Treatable Diseases Because They Were Poor

[mountain grammy]

20. But, but, all those waiting lines and horror stories from Canada and FREEDOM!

This story will make you cry and it's common in America. I first read this in the "Texas Observer," a publication that proves there are still thinking people in Texas.

We must get past the hysterical right wing message and spread this story and others like it far and wide. I had a "discussion" with a person last evening about a mutual friend who died two years ago because she had no money and minimal access to health care. She got her Medicare card just in time to pay for her last week in a coma.
The other person told me our friend took good care of herself and didn't need the medicines. Ha, bullshit! Her medicines were controlling her health issues. Then I was told her prescriptions were only $4. More bullshit. I paid for two of them more than once and they were over $100. The last few months of her life, she told me she had her prescriptions. She lied because her doctors wouldn't refill without seeing her and she didn't want to go back to the clinic because she owed them money, which I discovered when I took her to the emergency clinic with symptoms of stroke. Her blood pressure was 212/120, I'll never forget that! The clerk came in with paperwork and her past unpaid bill and I gave her Pat's brand new Medicare card. Up until then, I was sure they were going to send her home to die. Instead, they did some tests and flew her to Denver. A doctor told me " a few weeks sooner, and she probably could have been successfully treated.

Fuck Republicans and their false "freedoms." It's the "freedom" to die in poverty.