Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Don't break the wrong part of yourself.



In America we insure parts of our bodies separately. Eyes are covered by optical insurance. Mouths are covered by dental insurance. The rest is covered by "health" insurance.

In other words if you fall and break your nose and teeth and you have no dental insurance, only health insurance — a pretty common situation in America where dental insurance is considered a "luxury" — the doctor would fix your nose but not your mouth.

"Sorry, I know they're both located on the same appendage an inch from each other but you didn't have coverage for one of them. Good luck with the eating." 

How did this come to be? Why are our eyes and mouth treated differently from the rest of us by insurance companies? How did these parts of our bodies get carved off, so to speak, from the rest of medicine? They're crucial to our overall health, our body is one unit, why are they insured separately?

Imagine different car companies insured different parts of your car. You got in an accident and had to go to the fender insurance company to file a claim to fix your fender and the bumper insurance company to file a claim to fix the bumper. It would seem absurd. Surely someone would come along and offer to insure the whole thing to make it simpler for car owners.

Surely, someone, right?

The Worst Run Industry In America is my look at the American health care industry, its service, prices and promises, from my view as a merchant.


1 comment:

Liskill said...

This title is evocative. At once threatening, encouraging and confusing... What comes to mind first? Some physical aspect that we let define us? Psychological baggage? The forgetting of our strengths? Regardless, I'm putting this one away for later use.