I believe the children are our future
Teach them well
And let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty
They possess inside
Whitney Houston wrote and sang this in The Greatest Love of All.
The lyrics came to mind as I read this statistic:
Uninsured children are 60% more likely to die in the hospital than insured children regardless of medical condition, according to a large-scale study by researchers at Johns Hopkins University. Modern Healthcare (registration and annoying Dell popups req'd.)
Regardless of medical condition. That phrase caught my attention. All things being equal (same gender, age, condition, stage of diagnosis), the child with no health insurance coverage has a 60% greater risk of dying IN the hospital than their counterpart whose parents can afford health insurance.
Maybe that statistic rings...abstract. Maybe it does not connect. Here's where that statistic starts to apply: Lack of health insurance may have contributed to nearly 17,000 deaths among hospitalized children nationwide in the past 20 years...
17,000...in 20 years...That's 850 children per year, nationwide. 17 children per year, per state. 17 children per year, per state, for over 20 years died because their parents could not afford health insurance.
17,000 sets of dreams and skills, talents and strengths, lost.
17,000 families...devastated with the loss of a child.
17,000 parents being forced to bury their child.
And all because...what? Profit? Stock prices? Shareholder concerns? Quarterly results? CEO bonus plans? Companies too small to afford health insurance for their employees, too small to pay the wages necessary to provide health insurance for their employees and their families?
Sadly, the conversation on healthcare reform centers around costs. The costs are measured in...dollars.
What if we changed that term to lives?
What if we measured the costs of our current system, and any reforms, by the lives it saved? Or did not.
What if we discussed healthcare reform in terms of the lives saved, and the families, the dreams, the contributions with those saved lives...to our communities?
Would that make a difference?
* Photo credit: istockphoto, pixdeluxe
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