Political Quotes

“I think it is important to understand what the law says. The law says there is only one healthcare provider that by law has to treat every single person who comes in the door; they can't turn away individuals based upon their ability to pay. That is the emergency room. What we also know is that the emergency room is the place you get the most expensive care. By the time you get there, you are often in crisis. The care you receive in the emergency room is expensive, and then all of the care you need afterward is expensive as well. I always remember a woman from Connecticut who lost her Medicaid coverage. In losing her Medicaid coverage, she didn't end up being able to see a doctor for an infection she had in her foot. It was hurting her for a long time, that infection. She didn't have Medicaid any longer, so she just decided to let it hurt. She popped some Tylenol and hoped it would go away. One day it was so painful that she went to the emergency room, and it was too late. It was too late. Her foot had become so badly infected that she had to have that foot--that leg below her knee--amputated. She had no insurance, so we all picked up the cost of that, but she had her life altered in a way that is hard for us to fathom, and there is not a single winner in that scenario because, obviously, her entire life is changed because of that. It is not as if we had saved any money in treating her so shabbily because we ended up having to cover all of those costs. That is one story.…”