July 30, 2009

It Just Blows My Mind

A coworker today told me a story that I can't get out of my mind. The coworker's niece has a heroin addiction. She has private insurance. She tried to get into a 28-day inpatient treatment program. Her insurance provider responded that before they pay for an inpatient program, they'd like to see her fail a few times in an outpatient program. Fortunately she managed to harangue them into paying for her inpatient program, but they were willing to literally risk her life because inpatient programs are more expensive than outpatient programs.

Bill Maher's right: the profit motive has ruined our health care system. If you ever needed convincing that our system needs to be reformed, there it is.

1 comment:

sarah said...

I don't know about dyfs cases, but we have that happen with juveniles frequently enough. They are court-ordered to attend an inpatient drug rehab program & insurance refuses to pay for it. of course, because they have crappy parents, no one pushes the insurance company any further.

yes, it is very evil. bear in mind these are the same insurance companies which will pay for viagra/cialis/levitra for men for years without a question.