HW 30 - Illness & Dying - Culminating Experiential Project

For this project, i decided to explore the consequence of people being denied health insurance in America and the messed up system we have today. When watching sicko in class, the main reason this idea was put in my head was because in the beginning of the film Michael Moore conducts several interviews of Americans with health insurance and without to show how people in both situations handle it. Although a very biased continuation of interviews they all seemed to focus around the main idea that even if you have health insurance in America, as long as you have what the hospitals call a ''pre-existing condition'' your request for a life-saving surgery may most likely become denied.

A text from class that could be optionally read called Sick by Jonathan Cohn, discusses the roots of health insurance and how the system got to be the way it is today. Cohn writes: "..economics alone can't explain why the self-employed and people in small businesses (who face a similar situation) end up struggling to find affordable health insurance" (31). In class, a woman named Beth Burnette told her story of her final hours spent with her husband. She explained that it was at first a difficult task to find a doctor that would actually show special care towards her husband, but luckily found somebody to help her. She helped me gain insight on this aspect of illness and dying, that sometimes people just get lucky

When interviewing my family friend about the care he received in the hospitals in California, he too recalled that the treatment he finally received was "lucky" as well. He claims that he was flown to Stamford for extra care, and that it took a while for anyone to pay any special attention to his situation. My family friend and i discussed this idea of being lucky in a hospital, it's horrible to think that health insurers/doctors may sometimes think of your life as a gamble. They can do whatever they want, and honestly, your health is less money for them. Why should they be so concerned? the thought is kind of sickening.

In a recent new york times article called: When Insurers Put Profits Between Doctor and Patient by Pauline W. Chen, Chen recalls a story back in late 2007 of Nataline Sarkisyan who was a 17 year old girl in desperate need of a liver transplant. Doctors said that if the transplant went through, Nataline would have a 65 percent chance of living. Nataline was put on a waiting list, but even if she received the transplant her fate rested on her health insurance company: Cigna, who denied Natalines request because the treatment was "experimental". As Natalines story started to draw more attention, Cigna started to become more concerned with the look of their company. They reversed the decision, but it was too late and Natalie passed away. Wendell Potter, who has been in the buisness for about 20 years discussed with Chen how the situation was handled. Potter (who was the head of corporate communications at Cigna) explained that Cigna was concerned about Natalines situation mainly for political reasons, and made a huge effort to fight off protesters and articles claiming that Nataline would have gotten the care she needed if she lived in somewhere like Canada or France. Potter was fed up with the situation, he left corporate relations six months after Natalines death claiming that he had "sold his soul" (2).

From this project, i gained an insight on a topic i consider very essential to learn. We should all know who is handling our health, and what they are doing so we can stand up and have our own voice and not just let powerful companies (such as Cigna) get away with greed. This aspect shows that dominant social practices of illness and dying in our culture mostly revolve around money and greedy actions of CEO's and heads of companies who are only concerned for themselves, and that although people have tried to make a change in the past couple of years, nothing too significant has changed. This subject matters a great deal because it is not just a subject, our lives are obviously necessary and we should take more action to fix our current health care system.