Cora of Chattanooga, TN

Cora of Chattanooga, TN writes:

My Christian faith moves me to love and care about people. I was diagnosed with cancer a few years before the ACA became law.  I have two adult children, 5 grandchildren, and 7 great grandchildren.  I routinely volunteer to make my neighborhood better.  After working over 40 years I was laid off for the last time.  I found myself with no insurance and receiving occasional ‘charity’ care. In January of 2013 I received my first understanding about the ACA and I went on to educate myself further. The fact that I am unemployed, a senior, a woman, and an African American with a pre-existing condition made my chances of receiving quality healthcare slim.  The ACA gave me a chance to have affordable insurance and quality healthcare.

Before the ACA I sat in the charity wing of the hospital once a month, waiting for a doctor to come down from his office to see charity patients.  The room was crowded with patients in wheelchairs, some with their Chemo ports exposed.  They were usually very pale and covered with blankets.  The doctor would come and spend 45 minutes to an hour seeing over 20 cancer patients.  I was one of them.  I was grateful for his desire to donate ‘charity’ time, because without insurance that was all we had.  After the ACA I went to that same doctor’s office.  Some of the charity patients seemed to have gained weight.  We were given lunch while we waited for the process of chemo or other meds to be administered in our veins. The patients were Democrats, Republicans, Black, white, Latino, male, female, young, old, disabled, etc.  I loved them all

Today I am NOT cancer free. We (the cancer charity patients) want to maintain or improve our health. The provision of preexisting conditions is MAJOR for us. Free PREVENTATIVE care is necessary for a healthier America and for lowering the sky rocketing costs of emergency rooms.  The ACA (law) fills a basic human health need.  Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. Keep it and make it better.  That is what we (America) did with the Wright brother’s airplane. RIGHT??

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