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Donate a kidney: Lose Health Insurance

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Hurrah for Obamacare! 60%  60%  [ 9 ]
The AARP is Commie Scum! 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
This idiot should be left to die! 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
Minnesota's Comprehensive Health Association high-risk pool should be repealed! 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
Obamacare should be repealed! 13%  13%  [ 2 ]
Mr. Royer never should have donated a kidney in the first place! 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
Just show the results. 27%  27%  [ 4 ]
Total votes : 15

ArrantPariah
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13 Nov 2012, 5:18 pm

http://www.aarp.org/health/health-insur ... rance.html

Quote:
Donate a Kidney, Lose Health Insurance
You may have trouble getting private insurance if you're an organ donor

How can a perfectly healthy father donate a kidney to his daughter and then be turned down for health insurance on the grounds that he has a preexisting condition?

That's what happened to Radburn Royer, 57, a retired high school teacher in Aitkin, Minn. His daughter, Erika, 31, was on dialysis three times a week because of kidney failure from lupus. "I had to help her," he says.

So, like any potential organ donor, Royer was carefully screened, found to be healthy and allowed to donate a kidney to his daughter, who is no longer on dialysis.

But now, Royer can't get private health insurance. Instead he buys coverage from the state's Comprehensive Health Association high-risk pool, which costs him $130 more a month and has a higher deductible.

Before his daughter's transplant, four years ago, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota provided Royer's health insurance. But it rejected his application for coverage last year and has turned down several appeals. The reason: "chronic kidney disease." Blue Cross and Blue Shield cites the higher than normal creatinine levels in his blood, Royer says. Creatinine is an indicator of how well a kidney is functioning, and donors tend to have higher levels.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield declined to comment on Royer's case but said a person with one kidney who tests within normal ranges would be a strong candidate for coverage.

Unfortunately, Royer's dilemma probably won't be resolved until 2014. That's when provisions in the new health care law take effect to prevent insurers from denying coverage due to preexisting conditions.



ruveyn
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13 Nov 2012, 6:46 pm

No good deed shall go unpunished.

ruveyn



Misslizard
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14 Nov 2012, 10:23 am

^^^^^^^Ain't it the truth.



Vexcalibur
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14 Nov 2012, 4:48 pm

Donating a kidney does reduce your health chances. So...


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auntblabby
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15 Nov 2012, 2:44 am

bloodsucking insurance companies and their devil's advocate defenders :x



ruveyn
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15 Nov 2012, 10:24 am

From a purely actuarial standpoint, the insurance companies do have an argument.

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CyborgUprising
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15 Nov 2012, 11:32 am

What's next? African-Americans/blacks can't get insurance because their race experiences higher levels of heart disease and is at risk of dying from breast and colon cancer. Is race now a pre-esisting condition? Will persons with autism or mental illnesses no longer be covered because it is a pre-existing condition? Even after 2014, insurance companies will find new loopholes to exploit, slip in their own clauses in the form of earmarks or have lobbyists fight for them.



ruveyn
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15 Nov 2012, 3:16 pm

CyborgUprising wrote:
What's next? African-Americans/blacks can't get insurance because their race experiences higher levels of heart disease and is at risk of dying from breast and colon cancer. Is race now a pre-esisting condition? Will persons with autism or mental illnesses no longer be covered because it is a pre-existing condition? Even after 2014, insurance companies will find new loopholes to exploit, slip in their own clauses in the form of earmarks or have lobbyists fight for them.


People more likely to make a claim should pay higher premiums. It is just simple actuarial calculation.

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abacacus
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15 Nov 2012, 5:24 pm

ruveyn wrote:
From a purely actuarial standpoint, the insurance companies do have an argument.

ruveyn


Very true, but I find it a very difficult argument to support on moral (emotional, I know) grounds. It just seems... wrong.


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The_Walrus
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15 Nov 2012, 6:26 pm

The solution? Introduce a National Health Service so nobody needs Health Insurance!



ruveyn
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15 Nov 2012, 8:35 pm

The_Walrus wrote:
The solution? Introduce a National Health Service so nobody needs Health Insurance!


Then we can all wait in line for medical service.

ruveyn



auntblabby
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16 Nov 2012, 12:19 am

ruveyn wrote:
The_Walrus wrote:
The solution? Introduce a National Health Service so nobody needs Health Insurance!


Then we can all wait in line for medical service.

that kind of rationing is still more humane than the kind we have now where if one is working class [as opposed to indigent] one just has to tolerate being sick sans medical treatment. the homeless get much more health care than the working class. where is the fairness in that?



thewhitrbbit
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16 Nov 2012, 12:23 am

auntblabby wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Walrus wrote:
The solution? Introduce a National Health Service so nobody needs Health Insurance!


Then we can all wait in line for medical service.

that kind of rationing is still more humane than the kind we have now where if one is working class [as opposed to indigent] one just has to tolerate being sick sans medical treatment. the homeless get much more health care than the working class. where is the fairness in that?


We need to achieve a middle ground between people not having insurance and people waiting 9 months to see a specialist.



auntblabby
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16 Nov 2012, 12:28 am

thewhitrbbit wrote:
auntblabby wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The_Walrus wrote:
The solution? Introduce a National Health Service so nobody needs Health Insurance!


Then we can all wait in line for medical service.

that kind of rationing is still more humane than the kind we have now where if one is working class [as opposed to indigent] one just has to tolerate being sick sans medical treatment. the homeless get much more health care than the working class. where is the fairness in that?


We need to achieve a middle ground between people not having insurance and people waiting 9 months to see a specialist.

i guess ACA ["obamacare"] is [for better or worse] that "middle ground" in terms of what can be achieved with our dysfunctional national politics. it still beats the daylights out of the big fat nothing which existed for the working class before recently.



Kurgan
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16 Nov 2012, 9:29 am

Clean up the mess that is the American healthcare budget, then free healthcare could be implemented. If necessary, taxes on people without degrees could be increased a little as well (let's be frank here: a 15% income tax is very low).

When an average car in an American household has 225 horsepowers, 60 percent of all households have gas powered stoves, 40% of all new cars sold have full leather interiors, an average household has 120 TV channels, and you can get gas for next to nothing (yes, American gas is extremely cheap), but people "deserve to die" because they can't afford surgery, something is seriously f****d up.



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16 Nov 2012, 9:43 am

Like many other businesses, insurance companies are run by the advice of the bean counters and lawyers.


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