something sparkly this way comes…

Universal health care for everyone. EVERYONE ON THE PLANET. And by that I mean good, effective, reasonable health care where the doctors and nurses don’t treat you as if you are a blight upon the Earth. Or crazier than they’ve ever seen before. Or stupid and ignorant. Even if you are. I don’t intend for doctors and hospitals and drug companies to go broke or die trying, no, not at all, but to be simply reasonable about the whole thing. For those of us who require more, erm, attention in the health care department than others, I think that it shouldn’t break your bank to try to be well. I think that Big Pharma ought to change the wording for their “indigent patient programs.” Here’s what the dictionary had to say about the word indigent:

Deficient in what is requisite. Oh, man, is that a stigma. As if we needy folks aren’t needy enough, you have to add stigma to the top? And I, working retail, make too much money to be considered. Do you know what retailers are paying these days? Oh yeah, there’s a pretty passable discount, but do you actually know what my paycheck reads for standing on my feet with crazy clown smile on my face pushing one more extravagantly priced knife, one more hurricane lamp, forty hours a week? After taxes and insurance (for both of us, because as a one-man operation, my husband doesn’t qualify as a small group for insurance), it isn’t much. I took a pay cut to work where I do now (but the insurance is actually better and cheaper than at my last job, so it kind of evens out), and my employers are pretty high up on the pay scale retail-wise, trust me, I’m not cranking on my job, just the whole benefits thing. Ha! They have the nerve to refer to the whole scam as benefits. And I’m at the mercy of the insurance company, they get to decide if I’m worth the cost of my medication. One company, years ago, decided that they weren’t going to pay for brand-name Wellbutrin any more, just for bupropion, the generic. My thoughtful pharmacist (can you taste the sarcasm?) informed me that it was a “Class A generic,” meaning that they are bioequivalent (containing the same active ingredients as the original formulation). However, as Wikipedia points out, “Bioequivalence, however, does not mean that generic drugs are exactly the same as their innovator product counterparts, as chemical differences do exist. Some doctors and patients emphatically believe that certain generic drugs are not as effective as the products they are meant to replace…” She then adds, flippantly, “I mean, it can’t hurt to try it, right?” Lady, it will hurt you, me, and anyone who gets in the way if this shit doesn’t work. Luckily, for everyone, it did work, up until recently.

Or maybe I’m just cranky.

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