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Wednesday, May 27, 2015

A RedEye Repost: Yes, Governor Siegelman, not expanding medicare is killing people, but you already knew that

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Charlene Dill didn’t have to die.
If  this headline  accompanied the photo above, what do you want to bet the media, and every republican in the state, would be calling for the former Alabama Governor's  impeachment, or worse

From the files of IOKIYAR (It's OK If You Are Republican)
Next time you see someone like Americans for Prosperity’s Jennifer Stefano shouting about the ridiculously generous benefits for Medicaid under Obamacare, you might want to picture Charlene Dill in your head. Charlene Dill was a 32-year-old woman who had three kids, was separated from her husband, and, with a combination of part-time jobs, was barely scraping by. She got booted off Medicaid because her princely $9000 a year was too much income — she couldn’t afford a divorce yet, so the program took her estranged husband’s income into account. And that was a problem, because Charlene Dill had a heart condition that could be managed with medication, which she couldn’t afford without Medicaid. And so on March 21, Charlene Dill died of heart failure while demonstrating a vacuum cleaner at a home in Kissimmee, Florida. She would have been covered by Medicaid if Florida had agreed to expand the program under the Affordable Care Act, but Florida’s legislature has so far blocked it, because Obamacare is bad, and handouts make people lazy.
Yes, Red States,  not expanding medicare is actually killing people, but you already knew that.
Alabama residents protested in front of the Capitol on Saturday to demand that Gov. Robert Bentley (R) expand the state’s Medicaid program. The move would provide health insurance coverage to 200,000 low-income residents who fall into a coverage gap in the Affordable Care Act.
More than 40 organizations under the umbrella group Save OurSelves: A Movement for Justice and Democracy, or SOS “presented 13,653 signatures to the Capitol doorstep in a coffin carried by six pallbearers,” the Montgomery Advertiser reports. Individuals told personal stories of waiting years to access coverage, with some eventually dying from lack of health care. A recent study conducted by Harvard researchers estimated that as many as 17,000 people will die directly as a result of their states refusing to expand Medicaid.
How many more people have to die?

8 comments:

Brian said...

Expanding Medicaid would create other problems for the state that creates a damned if you do, damned if you don't for our elected officials. The State Constitution has a balanced budget amendment. If we don't have the funds to pay for it, we have to either cut it or cut something else to pay for it. Medicaid is one of those things that we can't cut. What usually gets cut is Education. Reason being that even now without expansion, Medicaid is the largest part of our state budget, it is nearly half of the state budget. Second on the list is Education and it is over half of what is left.

And Medicaid is protected from prorationing. Education is not.

So if we expand Medicaid and we do not get the funds to pay for it, Alabama's kids will be the ones taking the hit among other things.

Redeye said...

Expanding Medicaid would save lives. The expansion is paid for with tax dollars, you know, the same tax dollars that pay for illegal and immoral wars.

Brian said...

Tax dollars from where? Alabama or the Federal government? What happens if those tax dollars are not there? Is it like the jobs created by the stimulus that the Federal Government paid for the first year and first year only?

The State of Alabama is not allowed to have a debt unless we have a repayment plan already in place. That is why the Education Budget was being prorated year after year because education is one of the few items in the state budget that can be prorated. If the funding for the Medicaid expansion is not there, Education will be taking the hit for it...

Redeye said...

The same place we got the tax dollars to fund all war all the time, unfair and unbalanced.

Unknown said...

Gawd damn, that is evil. her poor children and family! This is so incredibly sad.
As for robert bentley, may he be cursed with a horrific health condition that all his money can't cure.

Redeye said...

Welcome FL Jones, thanks for reading and commenting. I don't wish any harm to Governor Bentley but I do wish he would take the medicaid expansion. Don't be a stranger.

Anonymous said...

Governor did not kill this woman!! Again you and others worry about this but never write or worry about how many blacks are killed by other blacks right here in Huntsville!! Also you and others do not worry or write about all this shootings that did not result in a death. We are killing ourselves far more often than any Medicaid not approved in Alabama will kill!!

Redeye said...

First of all I never said the governor killed this woman. Secondly, this is RedEye's Blog and Eye will write about what Eye want to write about. If YOU want to write about how many blacks are killed by other blacks right here in Huntsville, YOU write about it on YOUR blog.