Day 11 - Medical Emergency!

I guess people write blogs for different reasons. For some it’s a personal journey, others a purge of the demons, for others an admission to no one in particular of certain facts. Others just to share. What will probably be quite common is that the intended audience may not be who you think they will be. The content of the blog may or may not offend individuals and conversely the expected / unexpected comments may offend the blogger.

This is my experience so far. So my question to myself today is; what more do I expect from this experience?

I would hope, I think, to spark a thought or two in whoever reads this, I would hope for some reasonable debate and I would hope that I would grow, personally, from this.

I think it’s important to state here that this is a collection of my thoughts, my critiques and my observations. Some of it may be negative because I’m human and my thoughts and doings are the product of my environment. Those who tell you that all is positive in their life are either living in denial, lying or hiding something so I make no apologies to you if my thoughts differ to yours, but I would like to hear from you via the comments box on the blog.

Don’t you find it weird that people will make life changing decisions that affect generations of their future offspring, based on lifestyle? For example (and I say this in case you think I’m anti South Africa, which I’m not) people will move back or to South Africa because the lifestyle is better than where they are. Because the sun shines! Because meat is cheaper and we can braai / BBQ at the weekends! Because we have the best rugby team! There are a number of web sites and public forums that extol the positive virtues of living in South Africa but conveniently fail to inform properly about the negatives. And there are negatives. Lots of them. As much as you don’t want to hear about them, as much as you are homesick in the countries in which you live and have favourable memories of SA, they exist, and you should consider them. And South Africa is not unique in this. But because I live here, and because I vote, I can comment. And you can agree or disagree.

So let’s not talk about crime. Everyone has a story, as you know.

Let’s talk about one of the many hidden taxes. Let’s talk about medical aid and private hospitals.

If there is a grudge payment out there then this is it! Now, I’m not an expert at all about this and maybe I just don’t understand it but the generation that currently exists right now pays this “tax” because it’s supposed to guarantee our right to quality medical care. We have long ago forgotten that it’s actually the government’s responsibility, via our taxes, to provide quality medical care and assistance. We accept that to survive trauma in this country we need cover. We nod in acceptance that medical aid funds, although highly regulated, make obscene profits, that our loyalty to these funds is as valued as the last monthly debit order. But no one says anything, no one challenges the system. No one wants to be without it in the event of trauma. God forbid. (And I know someone, without medical aid, who died because their spouse couldn’t, on a Sunday night, raise 50k as a security deposit for the hospital)

And when trauma does happen, and if you have medical aid, you invariably end up at a privately run, for profit, hospital. And everyone breathes a sigh of relief. Until the bills start rolling in. You know. The ones that your medical aid was supposed to pay for. Your specialist is contracted out, the X Ray dept is privately run and contracted out, the Path lab is contracted out, oh no you didn’t have pre authorization for this or that. But don’t worry, they all say, submit our over inflated profiteered invoices to your medical aid for a refund from them – and you can deal with the medical aids overly complicated and not particularly helpful admin dept. Good luck with that! (and this is where a clever broker comes in – if you have a good broker, hang onto them, they could end up saving your life, literally!)

And to top it all off, why in this super expensive environment, is hospital food still so shit!

Is this negative? Am I the only one to have had these experiences? Am I really shit out of luck?

Look forward to hearing from you.

Until tomorrow. God speed.