Las Vegas Aftermath On Medical Bills Proves Why We Need Medicare-For-All

If this doesn’t prove that we desperately need a new healthcare system, I don’t know what will.

By now, most of us have heard or read about this terrible tragedy. It’s still unbelievable to hear those statistics; almost 60 dead, hundreds more injured. But there’s a little aspect of this story that actually brings Medicare-for-all into this conversation.

With a Medicare-for-all system, everyone is covered. No if’s, no but’s, no deductibles, no premiums, just high quality health insurance. No questions asked. The rest of the industrialized world has successfully used this system, but because the health insurance industry buys off politicians and elections, we don’t have this system here in America. This leads to some just not being able to afford health insurance, and many overpaying for low quality care. High deductibles, high premiums, high copays, with no pay off. And if a serious medical emergency arises, good luck trying to get them to pay for it.

In this system, people can either pay it out of their own pocket if they have the money, go bankrupt, or roll the dice and hope that some type of fundraising campaign gets enough public attention and sympathy. And this is exactly what Las Vegas victims are having to resort to right now.

The Intercept reports:

The hundreds wounded are being tended to in Clark County’s network of hospitals in Nevada. But because this is a country that has never had guaranteed universal health care, they will soon be besieged by a second tragedy: enormous medical bills. This morning, Clark County Commission Chair Steve Sisolak, set up a GoFundMe, a private crowdfunding platform, to request charity for those injured in the massacre.

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Asking strangers for charitable donations to tackle medical bills is ubiquitous in the United States. A report by NerdWallet released in 2015 found that $930 million of the $2 billion raised by GoFundMe since its 2010 launch have been related to medical bills. Yet NerdWallet’s comprehensive survey of crowdfunding sites found that barely 1 in 10 medical campaigns raised the full amount they asked for.

Pause. Nearly half of what GoFundMe raises is related to medical bills. This is serious stuff, we’re talking about life-saving surgeries, or medicine, and so on. But, less than 10% of these campaigns actually raise enough money to solve the problem.

A frequent conservative talking-point against Medicare-for-all is having to pay for someone else’s medical bills, even though you’d be paying less in healthcare costs than with our current system. But putting that aside, what people with medical bills they can’t afford often do is set up a GoFundMe. That is direct payment of your money to someone else’s medical bills. Unsurprisingly, we find a contradiction in conservative talking-point logic.

But, the Intercept continues:

Contrast this American experience with that of some of our allies. In June, dozens of people were injured and eight people were killed when London terrorists ran a van through a crowd and then proceeded to stab multiple people.

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In the United Kingdom, most health care is free. The National Health Service, erected in the ashes of World War II, provides comprehensive health care to all British residents.

At the London attack, NHS staff were on the scene within six minutes, aiding the injured. Last month, the NHS gave a special honor to the first responders, nurses, and doctors who aided the victims of the London terror attack. “They highlighted the resilience and the compassion of the NHS staff who time after time responded to victims, who had suffered unimaginable injuries — putting the needs of those people first. This is the NHS at its best,” Jane Cummings, chief nursing officer of the NHS, said.

Wait, wait, wait, according to Republicans, isn’t government health insurance despised in the UK? Isn’t UK’s healthcare system low quality? Turns out these claims were 100% completely and unequivocally wrong. UK’s healthcare system allowed for the proper care and attention that victims needed, free of charge from them, or other citizens. America’s healthcare system is making its victims start fundraisers which will very likely not be successful, making the possibility of bankruptcy via medical bills extremely likely.

Any rational human being would look at the information just presented and conclude not only that our system needs to be changed, but that it needs to be changed to a Medicare-for-all healthcare system. Thankfully, most of America is rational, since 60% of the American people favor Medicare-for-all. However, our “journalists” haven’t even touched on this issue at all.

How has this been covered? “Oh, ISIS took responsibility, and we trust that completely even though ISIS has taken responsibility for other acts that they weren’t involved in. Oh, let’s have an awkwardly long interview with the killer’s brother. And guess what, we’ll rarely mention the issue of gun control, and never mention one of the defining issues of our time, healthcare.”

Major kudos to The Intercept for covering this, and for being the only major outlet doing so, because literally every other outlet, online, cable, whatever, is refusing to cover this aspect of the tragedy, an aspect that might affect those victims’ lives for the rest of their lives (medical bill bankruptcy). Washington Post, Huffington Post, Politico, The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN, if you can’t do your jobs as respectable journalistic outlets, get out of the way, and let independent media take the wheel. The Intercept is not connected to Washington elites. The Intercept is not connected to the establishment way of doing things, it’s not connected to a corporate America bubble, it’s a media outlet that speaks truth to power like a media outlet should because unlike the main media sources of the United States, it is not connected to the corporatist and elitist circles dominating American politics.

But not only is it the media’s job to be informed, it’s yours. Tell your friends that a very important aspect of this story is being completely ignored by our media, and that it’s one of the defining issues of our time, healthcare. Don’t let this slip through without analysis; everyone, everyone needs to know that the aftermath of this brutal attack provides yet another piece of proof that shows that America must set up a Medicare-for-all healthcare system.