Should Obama and Grandma Botox get their way, this is what we’re headed for.
Suffering from brain cancer, Kent Pankow was literally forced to go to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. for lifesaving surgery — at a cost to family and friends of $106,000 — after the health-care system in Alberta left him hanging in bureaucratic limbo for 16 crucial days, his tumour meanwhile migrating to an unreachable part of the brain, while it dithered over his case file, ultimately deciding he was not surgery worthy.
Death panels? What death panels? I ain’t see no death panels here, no sir.
But wait, there is more!
Now, with the Mayo Clinic having done what the Alberta Cancer Board wouldn’t authorize or even explain, but with the tumour unable to be totally removed, the province will now not fund the expensive drug, Avastin, that the Mayo prescribed to keep him alive and keep the remaining tumour from increasing in size — despite the costs of the drug being totally funded by the province for other forms of cancer.
Kent Pankow, as it turns out, has the right disease but he has it in the wrong place.
Had he lung cancer, breast cancer, or colon cancer, then the cost of the drug — $4,555 per treatment, two times a month — would be totally covered by Alberta’s version of OHIP.
Yeah, that’s what I love about government run anything, red tape. Lots and lots of red tape. And it makes such perfect sense!
Of course, I’m well aware of insurance company horror stories as well, but it’s obvious that socialized medicine is not the panacea some have made it out to be. In fact, with the debt the way it is, I’d still trust a “greedy” insurance company over the government plan any day.
found via Kathy Shaidle