That's because over three quarters of americans cannot afford health insurance and have their bills paid by the state the live in through an Access plan or they just don't pay their bills.

Let me tell you a story:

I always choose the best available option provided by my employer when it comes to health insurance. PPO, or whatever they feel like calling it this time around. I pay top $ on my premium for family coverage.
Then my wife gets Kidney stones pain on a thursday evening. I take her to the Emergency Room of our closes hospital. They don't want us to pay too much money so the send her home with prescriptions and a phone number to set an appointment to get the damn stone blasted. -$200 for the ER. -$48 for 3 prescr.

Allright then. We call the number and get a "we don't accept your insurance, try this other place"

ok... The other place says: "yeah... we can set an appointment for monday but we can't guarantee that you will have the operation done that day"...

Fine. Set the appointment... but in the middle of the night on Friday the pain is too much, even if she has pain medication. Back to the ER

This time the ER wan'ts to recover her... we spend all day there and at 4 pm they tell us:

"well... we would like to take care of you but we don't accept your insurance... we are looking at other hospitals to see who can do the operation and will accept your insurance"

fine...

at 7.45 pm they tell us: "we found the hospital and you will get tranferred there soon"

Awsome!

Next day the doctor visits her at the new hospital and this is what they say:

"well, the stone won't pass so we need to blast it.. but we don't have such a machine... we would have to transfer you to this other hospital, but they have no beds. You where tranferred here only becuase this is the only hospital in the valley that takes you insurance and had beds available. We will make one operation to reduce the pain she is getting and reduce the damage the stone is making... but we will have to wait until they have a room available at the other hospital before we can make this happen"

What?

Wait... they just called me to ask me how much I have paid already, so they can determine how much more they can bill me considering that the insurance only covers up to $250.

Are you kidding me?

So let me tell you another story... let's say this happened to me in Italy this is what would have happened.

I have the pain so I call my family doctor who then rushes to visit me AT MY HOME. There he diagnoses the possible kidney stones and calls the ambulance to take me to the hospital.
At the hospital they do the operation to insert the protective tube and then blast the stone. The next day they give me the medicine and send me home to recover.
During the whole recovery my family doctor visits me at intervals and checks my urin to make sure everything is fine. Within a week I am done and I have paid a total of Euros 0

Yes, they are taking alot out of my paycheck in Italy for this... but so is my Insurance company for family premium coverage.

So please tell me, why should I be happy of health insurance? Why should I be happy to pay the premium and then pay for pretty much all the rest? Why should I consider health insurance a good thing when it denied my wife from being taken care of the first day she had her symptoms?
What is the price that one poor soul has to pay to get the care all human beings deserves? Heck, my dog get's better cared for at the Vets and it costs me less.

No. This health system is flawed and the whole purpouse is to dain the helpless, who just want to feel better. Heck, I live in this foresaken country, the country should care for me... don't they want my vote afterall?

Daren