Occasionally, I like to play in games of chance - the games I feel fairly competent in being able to figure out the odds - but when if comes to figuring out US health costs I’m a dumb and dumber class.Every winter, like thousands of other snowbirds, I have to budget for out-of-province health insurance and, fortunately, for the past number of years I’ve paid out but never put in a claim.
However, costs are climbing especially in my case - on the wrong side of eighty - plus there’s the by-pass thing,
Sidebar The insurance stat guys have figured out heart by-pass operations are good for only ten years and anytime after that the odds favour redo time - it’s been twenty-three years since my quad so few insurance companies will take my action and the willing sock-to-me with extra premiums.
So this year I figure I’m on a streak - so far no claims - so I decide to up the deductible and save a few bucks - after all - I figure - this insurance is for the costly big hit like a heart attack, aneurism or drive by shooting - what are the odds?
If I’m in a car accident the auto insurance picks up the tab so what can minor mishaps cost? The odds - I figure - favour a higher deductible - that’s the way I figured it - but I’m an idiot.
Last month, while in Florida, I had a problem with the water works and had to go to emergency - no big whoops - with the help of an ex marine who is a nurse technician - whatever the hell that is - he installs a catheter and I’m out of there in under an hour - never saw a Doctor, just the ex marine - so I went to check out and pay the bill - total cost - $1,865 - guess what I decided for my deductible - $2,000 - then to add salt to the wee-wee - I was given a prescription and later that day I paid $78.25 for five pills as compared to $6.11 I would have paid back home.
Moral of this story - do not put a toe-tip across the border unless you have zero deductible out of province insurance.
Follow-up - we returned to my homeland of universal health care that very week and called my Doctor - four days later I’m in the hospital for a out patient fix-up and now Oscar and the twins are operating and happy once again.
One more to illustrate how lucky we are and so help me this is a true story - the conversation took place on my street in our Florida retirement community.
Close Canadian neighbours of ours, on their way to visit us, stopped to chat with an American neighbour - they told him how I had to visit emergency at the local hospital the night before for what turned out to be minor repair job and how I was complaining about the high cost of what I considered to be a minor undertaking.
"Welcome to my World." he said "By the way, on the subject of health care, can I ask you something?"
"Is it true all that stuff we’re hearing about how, in your health coverage the government has committees who decide what seniors get medical attention and which ones don’t?"
My friends reacted with jaw dropping disbelief - they were aware that such misinformation was being used by anti health care forces in the US, but who in their right mind would believe such crap - apparently many Americans do.
My friends explained our health system, noting that we pay higher taxes to pay for universal health care - how its based on a priority need basis, to which the American senior said he would gladly pay higher taxes.
So to would my wife’s Florida hairdresser - a single mom who pays five hundred a month for health insurance - her son became ill but her coverage didn’t cover the treatment - she is now seven thou in the hole and her insurance has been cancelled until she pays the seven grand.
In a recent issue of the St. Pete Times I read a letter to the editor from a retired American living in Port Richey who claims to have interviewed over a hundred Canadian snowbirds and reports that not one of them had a seriously bad thing to say about our universal health care - a few minor complaints - mostly about wait times.
Anyway, at the risk of having my father spinning in his grave - here’s to Tommy Douglas the democratic socialist who provided the blueprint for our medical care act - we are a lucky group of syrup suckers.
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