Fatal Mistake

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/14/opinion/sunday/kristof-a-possibly-fatal-mistake.html

This article although mostly about the state of healthcare for the uninsured, illustrates the sometimes profound benefit of early cancer detection. Symptoms ignored and untreated because of a lack of health insurance resulted in unpaid costs of many hundreds of thousand dollars and counting.  Also a life will almost certainly be shortened significantly.

We all help pay for these costs through local taxes and higher insurance premiums.

The article brought to mind my own diagnosis and treatment. http://pulltight.blogspot.com/2010/05/43-life-throws-curve.html.  Wonder what I would have done when my first symptoms appeared if I had not been insured?  Would I now be in the same shape as Scott?  As it turns out my early symptoms lead to an early diagnosis and treatment.  Probably I will live another 30 years.  But not so for Scott.

Comments

Anonymous said…
great points altogether, you just gained a new reader. What would you suggest in regards to your post that you made some days ago? Any positive?
5:02 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mom

Image
Cynthia McIntire Born to Ben and Montie Holmes Wann, the second of five children on April 9, 1927. Cynthia was born, raised, and lived in Paluxy where she spent the next more than ninety years. Only leaving Paluxy for a few months in Florida early in her marriage and then for her last couple of years in a nursing home as the result of a fall followed by a stroke. She is survived by Clinton (Junior to many), husband of 73 years, children Terry, Sheila, Sharon, sister Glenda, sister in law Jean, 7 grandchildren, and 15 great-grandchildren. While the last 3 years of her life were difficult because of declining health, very few of us will experience 91 good, happy years with family, friends, and home. And, this is what she had. She and Clinton were rarely apart. They worked together side by side on the farm. They traveled and socialized extensively after retirement mostly with the local Good Sams group of which they were members for over 25 years. She was a great mother, but cou
Read more

Smells of Summer

Image
The smell of freshly ground ginger root while making BBQ sauce and the smell of rain on a hot dry summer day are my favorites.  A brief rain while BBQing yesterday brought these two into close proximity. Also for the record, you can't open a beer with an electric can opener, even when when sober.  If you haven't had drunken chicken, it is worth a try.  The addition of crab boil to the beer makes it even better.
Read more

20 years BC

Image
"A dull pencil is greater than the sharpest memory" arthur unknown BC (before calculators) I remember when I was growing up, many of the farmers and ranchers carried these pocket pencils.  They were the calculator of the day.  And any flat surface would suffice for figuring the cost of a load of hay, how much you owed the hired hands, etc.  Seemed like there were numbers every where; on the faded paint of truck fenders, door frames and many pages of pocket sized note pads.
Read more