What If We Didn’t Have To Worry About Healthcare?
An American Fairy Tale
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My new government-issue healthcare card arrives promptly two days before Christmas on December 23rd, 2022. It looks like a driver’s license, but there’s no photo. Just my name and an ID number that will stay with me until I die.
The crisp image of a bald eagle superimposed over a caduceus is embossed on the card, the new symbol of America’s universal healthcare system.
As I tuck the card into my wallet, the significance of this moment hits me and I smile with relief. I take my old health insurance card out of my wallet for the last time, but I’m afraid to cut it up. Instead, I put it in a drawer with the others even though it’s worthless now.
On January 1st, 2023, 400 million Americans wake up with head-to-toe healthcare coverage, funded and managed entirely by taxpayers like myself.
This includes everything, from routine checkups and tests to treatment for complicated diseases and conditions to palliative and end-of-life care. Our new healthcare system also includes mental health, dental, vision, and emergency care.
This year, I will no longer need to pay hundreds of dollars each month for my health insurance premium. Instead, I can pay down debt, buy some much-needed household supplies, and tuck a bit away in a savings account.
The deeply-rooted anxiety that’s had a stranglehold on me since my older daughter was diagnosed with cancer at the age of eleven, begins to loosen its grip.
On the first business day in January, I make an appointment with my optometrist. I haven’t had my eyes checked in over five years and I’m sorely in need of a checkup. At the age of 51, my eyesight is changing rapidly.
When I call to make the appointment, the receptionist doesn’t ask me what insurance I have. She doesn’t tell me that payment is due up front. She simply takes my name and schedules an appointment for the following week.
There are immediate health needs that my husband and I address right away, things we’ve put off too long because of the prohibitive cost — a hernia repair, a dental implant, a dermatologist’s evaluation of a questionable mole, an appointment with a psychiatrist and the subsequent prescription for an antidepressant.
I reach out to my old therapist, a woman who helped me manage the stress and heartache of caring for my daughter throughout her entire cancer treatment and, subsequently, after she died.
It’s been three years since my last appointment. I stopped going because my deductible was so high and each weekly visit cost about $100. It’s an understatement to say that it’s good to hear her voice. We find a weekly appointment slot that works for both of us and I feel that tight band of anxiety loosen a little bit more.
After a flurry of medical appointments, follow-ups, and long overdue tests, winter gives way to spring. My husband and I are lucky. We have no serious health problems. The hernia repair goes smoothly. My new glasses arrive and my constant headaches subside.
The issue of healthcare fades into the background of my life, as it should, though I still can’t quite believe that I’m covered. Occasionally, I take out my government-issue health card and stare at it, marveling at this new miracle.
Spring melts into summer and, as autumn arrives, I visit my doctor’s office to get flu and covid shots. They know me there and have my health ID number on file. I’m in and out in 15 minutes, protected (hopefully) from any unexpected viral catastrophes.
By November, it’s been nearly a year since I’ve had comprehensive, government run, health coverage. This used to be the month I started worrying about premium rates increasing for the next year.
I’d spend hours combing through the limited options in New York’s healthcare marketplace, settling on the plan that had the best balance of out of pocket costs and coverage. But I don’t have to worry about any of that anymore.
The physical signs of having access to healthcare are obvious. I’m feeling better than I have in years. My aches, pains, and concerns have all been addressed, as have my husband’s, and though our health isn’t perfect, we feel taken care of for the first time in years.
The psychological signs of universal healthcare are, perhaps, more subtle. I no longer obsess about potential healthcare emergencies. I don’t worry about getting the mental or physical care I need including worrying about paying for therapy, dental work or medication.
I stop calculating the odds of getting through one more year before something major happens in my family — another cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, an accident requiring an expensive air ambulance ride to a trauma center.
I am (beyond) grateful for this new freedom for myself and my family. I’m also grateful that my friends and family all have access to this same freedom. It is a true blessing that I no longer see GoFundMe campaigns on social media from people desperate to pay for the care they need.
I am grateful that my daughter doesn’t worry about getting sick. She will have what I didn’t when I was a young woman — free and unfettered access to doctors, therapists, dentists, and medicine no matter where she’s working or living within the United States.
It was all a dream. When I wake up on January 1st, 2023, I realize, with a sinking feeling, that universal healthcare still doesn’t exist in America. The Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare, is all I have as a freelance consultant. It’s not enough.
I don’t have vision care or dental or access to therapy. I get out of bed slowly and make my way to my computer, navigating to The New York State of Health website to begin the disheartening process of selecting a plan.
As I scroll listlessly through my options, I feel a pinch of pain in my chest near my heart and a tightness in my left arm. The cost of an ambulance ride to a hospital that’s just three miles from my house can be as high as $2000.
I ignore the pain, hoping it will pass.
