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Sick, Older, Vulnerable, Uninsured |
| Thu February 1st, 2007 |
By COLIN POITRAS
Courant Staff Writer
For seven hours Wednesday, lawmakers heard the stories of deprivation, sacrifice and pain. They were the stories of Connecticut's uninsured or woefully underinsured men, women and children, the hundreds of thousands of people who are the face of the state's health care crisis.
East Haven resident Carole Marie Pomerleau is 49 years old. She is a cancer survivor and a former quadruple bypass patient. She also has diabetes and, for six months, she has gone without her insulin because she can't afford it. She is stuck in a Medicare doughnut hole, she says, unable to afford her insurance company's deductibles for her medicine, and ineligible for more comprehensive catastrophic health coverage.
On Wednesday, she stood inside the state Capitol complex, leaning heavily on a cane.
"I'm picking and choosing what medications I am going to fill," said Pomerleau, who takes 12 medications a day. Her monthly income is about $1,880, some of which comes from long-term disability insurance. "Thank goodness for my parents and others who are helping me. My landlord is basically letting me live where I am for free. I haven't paid my rent since June."
Pomerleau was one of dozens of sick, elderly and infirm people who crowded into a standing-room-only hearing room to tell the legislature's public health committee their stories.
In between the stories, health care advocates, social workers, doctors and patients pleaded with legislators to do something.
It was the first public hearing on the state's raging universal health care debate, but certainly not the last word. There have been nearly a half-dozen proposals from the governor's office, from legislators, and from business and advocacy groups that could dramatically change the health care landscape in Connecticut.
Advocates suggested a full menu of changes: Raise health care reimbursement rates so people have access to more doctors; give small businesses tax breaks for insurance premiums to allow more coverage to the working poor; raise the income eligibility ceilings so more people will have access to state-funded health care programs.
Some of the most stirring testimony Wednesday came from mothers like Erin McCall-Goldie, 40, of Burlington, who worries that her 5-year-old son, Connor, won't get the surgery he needs to correct his cleft lip and palate.
McCall-Goldie is president of the state chapter of the advocacy group FACE, or Families Advancing Craniofacial Excellence. She said she has yet to get a commitment from her insurance company - Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield - that it will pay for the procedure in two years when Connor will need a crucial bone graft to repair the defect. Because it is listed as an orthodontic procedure, many insurance companies consider it cosmetic surgery and won't pay for it, she said.
So she worries and waits.
Virginia Downing, 56, of New Haven, said she has to take three buses to Bridgeport to see a dentist because none of the dentists in her area will take her state-funded health insurance.
"There is no reason in the world why we should be neglected or have to go to Bridgeport to get care," Downing said.
"Low-income people are just about fed up," said Merryl Eaton, director of advocacy for the Christian Community Action Lifeworks Center in New Haven, who traveled to Hartford with Downing Wednesday. "We're the richest state in the country, and yet we have 419,000 people who are not covered by insurance."
"Some people have crummy jobs and if they have to take time off to travel to get care, they can lose their jobs," Eaton said. "I know of people who have no teeth, who can't get jobs because they can't get proper health care."
Yejide Harris, 45, of Manchester, said she has worked two jobs to provide her three older children with health insurance since they all passed the age of 19 and were dropped from the state's affordable HUSKY health plan for children.
Harris, a health care worker at a private group home in Andover for adults with mental disabilities, said she had no choice but to put her children on her CIGNA health plan while they attend college. But her monthly insurance premium jumped from $40 to $400.
"I'm working additional jobs, going without stuff," Harris said. "But it bothers me because I'm not there for them. I'm working all the time."
State Rep. Peggy Sayers, a Windsor Locks Democrat and co-chairwoman of the public health committee, said legislators knew such heartbreaking stories were out there, and they are committed to doing something to address the problem.
"We understand people want us to provide better access to health care, improve the quality of health care and lower costs," Sayers said. She said she thinks some of the ideas discussed Wednesday were doable, but there will be much debate to come before anything is finalized.
The committee has to vote on a health care restructuring bill by March 26 before it can go to the General Assembly for a vote.
Contact Colin Poitras at cpoitras@courant.com.
Copyright 2007, Hartford Courant |
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