mogri : network

Health Insurance

Ray has been sick for almost a week now. He is getting better but he still coughs severely enough to throw up everything. Although I have been staying home all this week to take a care of him, I feel so bad that there isn’t much I can do for him.

This week Senate passed the historic health reform bill. While many people (left and right) are criticizing the shortcoming of the bill and funding for the bill, I think this is a great step forward to fixing dysfunctional social wellness system of the United States.

I can fortunately provide Ray all the health care he needs – thanks to Microsoft’s awesome health care coverage. From his birth to today, I haven’t paid single penny for his health care. As you know Ray has gone through many non-scheduled clinic visits since day 3 (jaundice, low glucose level, cold, fever, etc) and I was able to take him to the pediatrician without the second thought whenever I felt I had to take him. However, this is not always the case for many American families – I was one of them before. I remember my father used to tell us to be careful and to be preventive on any health related issue when I was in high school because the hospital cost was just out of the range that the family was able to afford at that time – we didn’t have any insurance coverage back then. I once broke my wrist during basketball and that costed us $200+ in early 90′s. I remember my father was so relieved that it did not cost us much.

I am glad that I don’t have to go through that any more and I don’t have to worry the same for Ray as my father once did for us. However, I can’t get rid of thoughts that how it would feel like if you have to take your kid to hospital but you are also so worried about the cost. Not just I feel sorry for those people, but I feel the health care reform is very necessary for America. Talking about lack of budget? Screw you. Take out budget from military. According to wikipedia, “for the 2010 fiscal year, the president’s base budget of the Department of Defense rose to $533.8 billion. Adding spending on ‘overseas contingency operations’ brings the sum to $663.8 billion”. I think we are just spending way too much for the military. Having trouble visualize what much we are overspending? Here is a good link for you to take a look.

http://www.globalissues.org/article/75/world-military-spending

If you try it, you can find money – that cannot be an excuse for not improving social wellness. Let’s hope that this bill really becomes the first step to the next great thing.