A friend's plea - Diabetes

A friend of mine found out she had diabetes when we were in the second grade. She always tested her blood and took her insulin shots like there was nothing out of the ordinary that she was doing. She never thought of herself as being sick or being different, and therefore neither did the rest of us. It's only recently that she has gotten married and desperately wants children that I am starting to realize that her juvenile diabetes is going to affect her.

We grew up in a very red state, and she still lives in that red state. She sent this email out yesterday and I thought I would pass it along. I never thought about these issues to the depth that she has, but they are obviously important to her. Please don't think I wrote this. Hopefully from the writing style alone you will see that it is not me.

Again this is political, so if it is going to cause a problem, then don't continue. It deals with the health care plans of those running for president:

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Friends and family, regardless of your political leanings (and I know
they are not the same as mine in many of your cases), please excuse this as my
ONE political email this election cycle. Those of you who disagree, fine. But
when you write me back with something inflammatory, remember that there are some issues on which more than a flag pin depend.

Please read this editorial describing the McCain / Palin healthcare reform plan: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/opinion/16herbert.html?th&emc=th

For those that doubt the legitimacy of the claims in Herbert's column,
please consult McCain's website here.

I have been denied individual private health insurance as a juvenile
diabetic throughout my adult life, regardless of my ability to pay. As a
self-employed private contractor, I relied on my parents' COBRA plan until it
kicked me off at a certain age and then had to look into the state risk pool for
the "medically uninsurable." (Only 34 states offer high risk pool insurance,
btw.) If it weren't for my husband's insurance through his job, I wouldn't be
able to afford the medical care I need. My prescriptions for 2 vials of insulin
and 400 test strips with insurance this month - $52.40. Without insurance? Over
$650. My doctor visits this month with insurance - $40. Without? $400. The list
goes on. Not to mention thousands of dollars a year in insulin pump supplies.
That's on top of the wage reduction my husband agreed to to get insurance
benefits through his contract company to begin with.

The Obama plan is not watertight either, you might argue, but it is not this. The McCain plan is to drive consumers into the individual private insurance market by taxing our employee benefits as INCOME - triple dipping, as it were. Once for the premiums you already pay to the health insurance company, twice for benefits-as-income, and really a third time for the right of the company to offer you less pay in
the first place for paying a larger portion of your health care contributions.
This is supposed to push us into the individual insurance market and drive
prices down. It's not that I don't understand Republican economic policy - take
restrictions off of businesses and the market will flourish and we will all bask
in the warm golden ooze of prosperity. It sounds great in theory - but I'm not a
business. I'm a consumer, an individual, a worker, a human. And I don't know
about you, but I don't see Exxon trickling any of their nice little windfall
profits to my corner of the market.

The "don't raise my taxes" crowd is going to tax me right off my
healthcare plan and then into a market where I am "medically uninsurable."
Natural selection brought to a new low. My husband is young and "healthy" by
conventional standards. He could probably find individual coverage at a high but
manageable rate. But some of us... McCain has said that his goal is "to restore
control over our healthcare system to the patients themselves." I sure hope the
a-hole sends me a first-aid kit and a flashlight.

~M