The 48-year old who doesn’t learn:
He’s the poster boy for the state’s new anti-smoking campaign. But 48- year-old Skip Legault is still smoking””despite an amputated leg, two heart attacks and a stroke . . .. . . In the ad, Legault, looking into the camera and supporting himself on crutches, recites a litany of health woes, including a first heart attack at age 28 and another at 29, then says: “Every bit of this is from smoking.”
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From the Poster Boy himself:
“And then I tell them that I’m afraid to quit smoking. I’ve lived longer than the doctors told me and it’s tough to change something while you’re still going.”
Fine. But your insurance coverage should be revoked. Medicare (”We”) should no longer pay your bills and frankly, if you aren’t the poster child for appropriate denial of care, I don’t know who is….
This guy is what’s wrong with our healthcare system today.
Baloney. People used to be in much worse health, smoked a lot more, engaged in more dangerous lifestyles, and drove unsafe cars.
So unless you want to say that the problems with our healthcare system were much worse 50 years ago and are getting much better as fewer people smoke, you can’t rationally blame them on smoking.
Correlation doesn’t prove causation but lack of correlation disproves it.
Sick people are not the problem with the healthcare system. That is like teachers complaining about kids starting school ignorant.
Besides, haven’t we looted the pocketbook of smokers to pay for the care of others for decades now? Don’t smokers pay more taxes than everyone else, and then die younger taking themselves off the social security roles sooner.
Categorizing people by their personal habits for the sake of government programs sounds too much like 1936 Germany to me. If this is indeed the natural outcome of healthcare socialism, then glory to day when it bankrupts and everyone is off the program–hopefully while we have a little freedom left.
Want to cut off the smoker. Why not the obese overeater as well? How about that skinny non-smoker who wore out his knee joints jogging. Why should “we” pay for that new knee—he did it to himself. What about hypertension in the fit non-smoking but type A ER doc. Should have taken a less stressful job. “we” didn’t enjoy the 200,000$ income, so pay for your own flipping bills for stress related conditions.
And all those narcissistic women too busy to bear children or breast feed the ones they did bear-thus increasing their risk of breast cancer. No medicare coverage for breast cancer treatment if you didn’t nurse at least 2 kids!
What about the back side–all those healthy people who exercise just right, eat just right, etc and now want to live to 95. Why should the rest of us pay the extra expenses of their lifestyle choices, selfishly living longer than the rest of us and draining the public coffers? Just cut them off both Medicare and social security when they reach the average life expectancy. That will teach them!
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