My story (feel free to excerpt)

Personally, I have lost my job (position cut) more than once, and found myself without insurance. When unemployed, COBRA is expensive! Over a thousand dollars a month… ugh! When I looked for new work, I had to limit myself to jobs that had insurance attached, and ended up accepting work which really didn’t suit me well, which I kept until I was Medicare eligible.

My son, now 38, has worked contract jobs, part-time without benefits for years, and since it is not dependable income, he has chosen to go without health insurance rather than pay $700-$1000 per month for a plan with is basically just catastrophic. He doesn’t qualify for Medicaid since his income is too high; the benefit/assistance he qualifies for from ACA is minimal. Believe me, he really needs health care, both medical and psychiatric, but he goes without due to lack of insurance. This is great cause for concern to his mother, me!

In my most recent employment, as an RN in a hospital based psychiatric program, one of my responsibilities was to cover for a full-time RN who was called the insurance specialist. The job entailed calling myriad insurance companies, for pre-approval, for coverage once admitted, and again every few days to have them approve continuation of care. Reaching the correct insurance rep can be tricky, and with a number of patients, this kept an RN quite busy; how inefficient this is, and how much simpler it would be if there were a single payer plan!

It is time to pass the NY Health Act, and have a level playing field for the haves and the have-nots; I’m also aware that over 50% of those WITH health insurance still forgo care at times due to the complicated system, and deal with denials by insurance corporations. In addition, many of those crippled by medical debt actually have health insurance. Obviously, something is deeply wrong with this system.