As a result, the hospital sent my bill, for a service that was to be paid by Near North, to a collection agency. On the other hand, it failed to file my “charity” papers on time – testifying that I would not have to pay because of my income bracket. This has meant that, on the one hand, it allowed me a free appointment for a lingering ear infection with an ENT specialist at Northwestern University Medical Hospital. The Near North Health Service Corporation is staffed by lovely people and even some decent doctors, but it habitually messes up its paperwork. The phrase, “before you were a twinkle in your parents’ eyes” has never seemed so strange before. In Arizona, lawmakers have declared that the rights of the “unborn” extend far beyond any limits of, well science, claiming that life begins even before conception. It’s a nice gesture, especially in a climate where unmarried, non-child-bearing women are considered expendable and useless and even procreative women are deemed useful only as bearers of children. I am practically a charity case at my local health care provider, a private organisation with some kind of a grant to guarantee all their female patients free yearly mammograms. ![]() I’m home free, and I can have my breasts examined. I keep waiting for the ball to drop: “Ah, yes, I see, yes, well, I’m afraid you really shouldn’t be here after all.”īut it all goes well. I scan their faces, wondering which ones seem more or less sympathetic to me, which one is more likely to scrutinise my credentials with more or less care. We are all waiting for stage two, as personnel step up and call out our names one by one, directing us each to any one of the kiosks staffed by people in blue uniforms. I am now in front of everyone else, everyone else who looks like they actually belong. I quietly exhale with relief when she she looks back up at me, ticks something off on the sheet in front of her, smiles and tells me to go through the door on my right. At any moment the smoothly coiffed blonde woman with the discreet earrings and the beautifully manicured hands will look at me with a frown and say, “You’re not supposed to be here. ![]() I can’t help feeling that I really shouldn’t be here. Excerpt: You want health care but not marriage or commitment? Tough titties.
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