Stupid Republican gubernatorial candidates think they're better than you by condemning Medicaid
My mother wrote a letter to Bill Brady and Jim Oberweis which was also published in the newspaper explaining things in ways I never could. It writes...
"Dear Sen. Brady and Mr. Oberweis,
Both of you have made comments recently about how shameful it is that 300,000 Illinoisans have been added to the welfare roles via Medicaid. I cannot speak for the other 299,999, but I can speak for one.
In March of last year, my husband and I were forced to sign up our son for Medicaid. You see, Rick had committed the unpardonable sin of living to the ripe old age of 19. Once 19, children cannot remain on their parents' insurance unless they are full-time students. Rick tried valiantly to remain in school, but he was too sick. So our insurance company dropped him.
Let me back up a bit. On March 1, 2001, Rick was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia. He was 16. Rick endured six grueling months of intensive chemotherapy. During that time, he was hospitalized repeatedly, with some stays lasting as long as a month. He dealt with the vomiting, diarrhea, hair loss and weight loss that come with chemotherapy. He also had to deal with countless life-threatening secondary infections common among chemo patients. After six months of this hell, he achieved remission and stayed that way until April 2002.
Then he relapsed.
Because chemo failed to keep him in remission, Rick needed a bone marrow transplant. There is no way to describe to you the horrors of such a process. First, five months of chemo. Then he and I spent four months in Chicago for the rest of the treatment. He received total body irradiation twice a day for five days. Then four more days of chemo. Then the transplant.
Transplant patients have seriously suppressed immune systems. As a result, infections are plentiful and life threatening. Rick experienced the common side effects of transplants--vomiting, explosive diarrhea, mouth sores so painful that he required a morphine pump, He also developed many infections, the most serious of which was a fungal infection in both lungs. He was put into a drug induced coma, hooked up to 17 IV pumps, and then connected to life support. We were told to get the family up to Chicago and contact a funeral home.
But Rick had other plans. He started getting better, not worse. He was off life support in three weeks. Three weeks after that, he was released from the hospital. He wasn't well enough to go home though, so we stayed in Chicago while he got stronger.
We finally came home just before Christmas, 2002. But weekly doctor visits--alternating between Springfield and Chicago--were necessary. Rick did pretty well at first, but in the Spring of 2003 he experienced the beginning of the end. The next two years were fraught with problems. He developed graft vs. host disease. in GvHD, the new marrow attacks some of the body's organs. Rick's liver was being attacked, and over the next two years, in spite of grueling and extensive therapies, the disease spread to his skin and mucus membranes. He was hospitalized twice a month, every months from September 2004 to March 2005. His problems were too numerous to mention here. Suffice it to say he was slowly deteriorating. On April 3, 2005 (the feast of Saint Richard), Rick entered the hospital for the last time.
With a staph infection and his liver shutting down, Rick was in agonizing pain from head to toe. The only part of his body we could touch was his left hand. On April 8, we stopped all treatment except pain medication. On April 13, Rick died.
So what does all of this have to do with Medicaid? For the first three years of Rick's illness, he was on our insurance. After he was dropped from our policy, he still required extensive treatments. I was able to administer much of his care at home. I gave him IV meds, tended his central line and changed his surgical dressings. But even with all we were able to do at home, his medical expenses were in the tens of million of dollars. His antiofungal was $4,000 a month. One of his GvHD meds was almost $15,000 a dose. Not a year or month. A dose. Those are only two of the 15 medications Rick took.
Without Medicaid, we would have had to declare bankruptcy. We would have lost our house, leaving the five of us homeless. We wouldn't have been able to afford his medications. And even if we had decided that Rick just wasn't worth the money, and opted to stop treatment a year earlier, we wouldn't have been able to afford the pain medication he needed to die peacefully. His death would have been agonizing beyond comprehension.
You say we've made 300,000 more people dependent on the state. I say we gave my son one more year of life. As painful as that life was, it was even more joyous.
He didn't let the disease rule his life or get in his way. He was upbeat, cheerful and always concerned about others. Last Halloween, Rick was a patient, but he dressed up like Batman and delivered candy to the kids in the Pediatric Department. One little boy thought Rick was the real Batman and wanted Batman's autograph. Rick obliged. There he was, Batman with an IV pole, making other kids feel better. And he did this just one day after he came off life support for the second time.
Gentlemen, I'm proud to live in a state that values health care. I'm grateful to the citizens of Illinois for helping us take care of our son. I want my tax dollars to help people stay healthy. I don't want my tax dollars making bombs or killing people or hiring someone to comb the governor's hair. But helping people stay healthy? That's exactly what I want my tax dollars to do.
You say Rick became dependent on the state. Tell me, please, for the love of God, Senator Brady and Mr. Oberweis. What else were we supposed to do?"
I love you, mom. And I love you, Rick.
"Dear Sen. Brady and Mr. Oberweis,
Both of you have made comments recently about how shameful it is that 300,000 Illinoisans have been added to the welfare roles via Medicaid. I cannot speak for the other 299,999, but I can speak for one.
In March of last year, my husband and I were forced to sign up our son for Medicaid. You see, Rick had committed the unpardonable sin of living to the ripe old age of 19. Once 19, children cannot remain on their parents' insurance unless they are full-time students. Rick tried valiantly to remain in school, but he was too sick. So our insurance company dropped him.
Let me back up a bit. On March 1, 2001, Rick was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia. He was 16. Rick endured six grueling months of intensive chemotherapy. During that time, he was hospitalized repeatedly, with some stays lasting as long as a month. He dealt with the vomiting, diarrhea, hair loss and weight loss that come with chemotherapy. He also had to deal with countless life-threatening secondary infections common among chemo patients. After six months of this hell, he achieved remission and stayed that way until April 2002.
Then he relapsed.
Because chemo failed to keep him in remission, Rick needed a bone marrow transplant. There is no way to describe to you the horrors of such a process. First, five months of chemo. Then he and I spent four months in Chicago for the rest of the treatment. He received total body irradiation twice a day for five days. Then four more days of chemo. Then the transplant.
Transplant patients have seriously suppressed immune systems. As a result, infections are plentiful and life threatening. Rick experienced the common side effects of transplants--vomiting, explosive diarrhea, mouth sores so painful that he required a morphine pump, He also developed many infections, the most serious of which was a fungal infection in both lungs. He was put into a drug induced coma, hooked up to 17 IV pumps, and then connected to life support. We were told to get the family up to Chicago and contact a funeral home.
But Rick had other plans. He started getting better, not worse. He was off life support in three weeks. Three weeks after that, he was released from the hospital. He wasn't well enough to go home though, so we stayed in Chicago while he got stronger.
We finally came home just before Christmas, 2002. But weekly doctor visits--alternating between Springfield and Chicago--were necessary. Rick did pretty well at first, but in the Spring of 2003 he experienced the beginning of the end. The next two years were fraught with problems. He developed graft vs. host disease. in GvHD, the new marrow attacks some of the body's organs. Rick's liver was being attacked, and over the next two years, in spite of grueling and extensive therapies, the disease spread to his skin and mucus membranes. He was hospitalized twice a month, every months from September 2004 to March 2005. His problems were too numerous to mention here. Suffice it to say he was slowly deteriorating. On April 3, 2005 (the feast of Saint Richard), Rick entered the hospital for the last time.
With a staph infection and his liver shutting down, Rick was in agonizing pain from head to toe. The only part of his body we could touch was his left hand. On April 8, we stopped all treatment except pain medication. On April 13, Rick died.
So what does all of this have to do with Medicaid? For the first three years of Rick's illness, he was on our insurance. After he was dropped from our policy, he still required extensive treatments. I was able to administer much of his care at home. I gave him IV meds, tended his central line and changed his surgical dressings. But even with all we were able to do at home, his medical expenses were in the tens of million of dollars. His antiofungal was $4,000 a month. One of his GvHD meds was almost $15,000 a dose. Not a year or month. A dose. Those are only two of the 15 medications Rick took.
Without Medicaid, we would have had to declare bankruptcy. We would have lost our house, leaving the five of us homeless. We wouldn't have been able to afford his medications. And even if we had decided that Rick just wasn't worth the money, and opted to stop treatment a year earlier, we wouldn't have been able to afford the pain medication he needed to die peacefully. His death would have been agonizing beyond comprehension.
You say we've made 300,000 more people dependent on the state. I say we gave my son one more year of life. As painful as that life was, it was even more joyous.
He didn't let the disease rule his life or get in his way. He was upbeat, cheerful and always concerned about others. Last Halloween, Rick was a patient, but he dressed up like Batman and delivered candy to the kids in the Pediatric Department. One little boy thought Rick was the real Batman and wanted Batman's autograph. Rick obliged. There he was, Batman with an IV pole, making other kids feel better. And he did this just one day after he came off life support for the second time.
Gentlemen, I'm proud to live in a state that values health care. I'm grateful to the citizens of Illinois for helping us take care of our son. I want my tax dollars to help people stay healthy. I don't want my tax dollars making bombs or killing people or hiring someone to comb the governor's hair. But helping people stay healthy? That's exactly what I want my tax dollars to do.
You say Rick became dependent on the state. Tell me, please, for the love of God, Senator Brady and Mr. Oberweis. What else were we supposed to do?"
I love you, mom. And I love you, Rick.