Well, it's wake up time. I hit the "donut hole" in my prescription drug program. For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, the Medicare Part D program got written by the insurance industry, not Congress. So they put in this nice little present for themselves, that screws those of us unfortunate enough to have serious medical problems. It's called a coverage gap.
Every year, you hit a certain dollar amount which includes what the insurance company has paid for your drugs, what you have paid in co-pays AND what you have paid in premiums. It's that last little bit that shocked me. So they add up the cost of my prescriptions, including the ones I pay 100% on because they don't cover that particular drug, and throw in my premium payments. And when you hit the magic number, BANG you've hit the coverage gap. Now you get to pay your premiums, and pay 100% of the cost of your drugs. In my case, I have to pay 100% until I have paid out $4,050, at which point they will resume payment of 50% of the drugs.
So, since I make $4.00 per month more than is allowed for prescription drug assistance, my prescription costs just jumped from $122 per month to $918.37 a month. That's a great insurance plan, isn't it? I can't stop taking the drugs; they're what's keeping the cancer from returning, among other things. But I begin to understand why people die from not taking their drugs. I understand why so many seniors are cutting their pills in half, taking less.
I don't know what I'm going to do for the next two months. I don't know what I will do next year when this happens again. We will be better off of course because we will be living in a house we own with no rent. But for now it is a huge shock, a crisis of sorts.
Guess I'd better try to sell some of these quilts. In this economy...
Would someone please explain to me why it is that the United States is the only major country in the world that does not have universal health care?
