A few recent letters seen in the Winona Daily News….

05/03/2005

Where did our compassion go?
By Dr. William Davis / Winona

I want to thank Jerome Christenson for his excellent column on the
developing insurance crisis in Minnesota. The fact that Minnesota has
the lowest rate of uninsured people in the country will not help
those people who get sick and die because we don’t have the
compassion to make sure that everyone has insured access to care. The
greed of the “I’ve got mine” society grows worse each day. As
competition forces employers to drop insurance coverage or offer only
high-deductible policies, the growing number of “under-insured” will
face the same choices. At the federal level we can offer big tax
breaks to the rich but we can’t afford to fund Medicare and Medicaid.

Where did we lose our way?

Facing hard choices
By Deborah Johnson / St Paul

I am one of those 30,000 people set to be cut off by MNCare. I have
worked and paid taxes my entire life. I currently am self-employed,
and use MNCare. The very things you talk about are so true. I have
been trying to figure out how to put my house in my son’s name in
case I should need to be hospitalized. I have two chronic diseases,
emphysema and rheumatoid arthritis. Either of these will leave me
uninsurable. I just learned of the $10,000 hospitalization cap this
year and have been trying to find out my best options. I have had
employees coverage my whole life, until three years ago. I may have
to give up my business and get a job again so I can have insurance. I
may have to give up everything and go on SSDI so I can receive
medical benefits. The choices are difficult to make. We would rather
pay more for our MNCare than spend down our assets, but the state
will be forcing us to hang our heads in shame and become dependent on
the state. We don’t have a lot, but let us keep our pride. Thank you
for understanding the moral dilemma, not just the financial one.

Was life better under the bridge?
By Mike Neil / Winona

You don’t have to be a communist to know that what’s good for your
neighbor is good for you. In fact, isn’t that in the Bible, too? If
the people around you are healthy, it affects you, too.

Now, I’m not one to complain about what I have. I’ve lived on
nothing, under a bridge - but now I’m older and have a family of my
own. I am on the MFIP program and am very grateful because the street
is no place to be with a 4-year-old.

Now Gov. Tim Pawlenty has me working 40 hours a week at $5.15 an hour
on the Welfare to Work program. Don’t get me wrong, I like the work -
it’s the pay that kills me. I have to pay someone else to raise my
son so I can go to work for someone else just to bring home $5 an
hour.

Now let me tie in what Jerome Christenson was saying (April 27). I
recently had another “episode” where I woke up choking and couldn’t
breathe. I decided, finally, to go to see a doctor. When I got there,
they tell me I can’t see a doctor until I pay a co-pay that Pawlenty
just put into effect. I had no money, so I was forced to “spare
change” to see a doctor.

Look, I’ve “spare changed” for a 40-ounce malt liquor, but never to
see a doctor.

To make a long story short, they want to do a sleep study on me, and
I don’t know if I am going to be able to afford it.

Sometimes I wonder if I was better off living under that bridge.