Health Vultures

Today's Saying

If minutes were kept of a family gathering, they would show that "Members not Present" and "Subjects Discussed" were one and the same. ~Robert Brault

I saw a bit of sixty minutes Sunday night and I learned one of the reasons Medicare is on the edge of going bankrupt. Believe it or not it wasn’t government inefficiency or regulation. It was plain old American greed.
This poor old lady was in a nursing home being fairly well taken care of. She was comfortable and she hjad friends. She was living out the last of her life the best that it could be lived. She had a bad heart and kidney problems and one day she passed out. To be on the safe side the Doctor associated with the nursing home admitted her to the hospital. Now that seems to be like a reasonable thing to do.
But once she was in the hospital the health vultures descended. She was visited by twenty five specialists including a psychiatrist. Each one billed Medicare separately. None of them in any way improved her condition. But these specialists ordered a whole barrage of tests to be made some of them painful. These were administered by and billed through the hospital helping to pay the bills of that vast institution and , of course, draining money out of Medicare.
Now , at most , she should have been seen by a kidney specialist and a heart specialist. After a horrible four days when she could have been enjoying tea with her friends in the home she was finally sent back weaker and in no way improved.
From us they took Medicare money, from her four days of life but they all got paid.
Now I don’t know if this is typical but I saw some of it in people I worked with as their Pastor. Greed pushes up the costs of the system and greed doesn’t really care about the patient.
It is so sad.

That which was now is not.
That which never was is now.

Well when the old lady/gypsy showed up yesterday they were only $57.78 short of the goal. The horses were ready , the cows were ready and the wagon was ready. They explained to her that they had tried their best to raise the full amount and hoped she would take what they had as a good faith gesture.
She explained to them that she would like to because she could use the money but this spell required the exact change. It was the nature of the spell and not an arbitrary number.
The people who had gathered looked crushed. People began to realize that they would be stuck here forever. They would never get back to 2009. The little girl who brought in her piggy bank began to cry.
Then they saw him.
He was walking all alone up the main street.
It was Eugene.
“ I have decided”, he announced, “ to stay with her. This is my decision made by my free will. I have thought about it since I got back. I have no family in 2009. I have no friends. No one will miss me except the bartender at the Fly Inn. For once in my life I can do a good thing. I can make up for a pretty worthless life. I had a great talk with Anna Belle the other day. I think I will enjoy being here with her. All I ask is that sometimes you remember me and that I cared a lot for this town.
Then he got up on the wagon and sat down holding the horse reigns.
The old lady smiled raised her hands and said

“That which never was is gone
That which should be is again. “

Then she said “the spell will work over night and tomorrow you will find yourself back in 2009.”
She got up on the wagon and gave directions to Eugene. As they moved into the woods it was as if it opened before them and closed after them and soon they were gone.
A strange quiet fell over the town.