May 02, 2004

Medi-Cal Fraud

I am disgusted by the L.A. Times article on Medi-Cal fraud perpetrated by wealthy senior citizens in California. They are allowed by loopholes in Medi-Cal laws to transfer assets to a family member and then to receive free nursing home services. To get Medi-Cal you must have no more than $2,319 in assets. California loses $150,000 per year on this fraud. This greediness goes on while poor disabled Californians are suffering severe and painful cuts in life sustaining services. This happens in other states as well. I work and my tax dollars are going into the pockets of a wealthy family! These selfish rich people exploit the system because they figure they have payed large sums of dollars into the system; so why shouldn't they get a free ride? First of all the rich don't pay a sufficient amount of taxes due to folks like George W. Bush who engineer laws to give tax breaks to the wealthisest amongst us. So we are getting screwed twice. This simply doesn't add up.

On another note does anyone think we could sue the FDA and or the pharmaceuticals for creating or allowing the dispensing of toxic drugs? I was just noticing in an old Schizophrenia newsletter that Haldol is known to be toxic. We also have known for years that Clozaril kills. Now we know that the atypical antipsychotics cause diabetes. I know a woman whose daughter died due to Clozaril. I have at least four friends who have diabetes due to the new antipsychotics. One friend who is diabetic now has cataracts on her eyes due to the diabetes. She is obese because of these drugs. I am worried about her. People die from diabetes. I'm upset too by Tardive Dyskinesia. I don't think I will live another day without this strange and painful disorder. This is madness and there is definitely discrimination against mental health consumers by NIMH, demonstrated by the lack of studies done to find new treatments for mental illness. Let me know what you think.

Posted by Butterfly Emerging at May 2, 2004 05:42 PM | TrackBack

Comments

My personal hope is that someone somewhere is coming up with better medications for Schizophrenia.
My son is 19 and was diagnosed just after his 18th birthday. The disease hit suddenly and with full force. I had no idea, at the time, that there were any antipsychotics good enough to let him live outside an institution.
Geodon has given him back a good portion of his life....until he decides to take a "vacation" from the meds. He has your same fears about the side effects, as do I. He has not experienced weight gain from it.
One of the problems we have here in Tennessee is that because he is on a state medical program, which almost no psychiatrists will participate in, at this time he gets no counseling and is not seen by a doctor; he gets nurse practitioners, one of whom can prescribe his antipsychotic meds. We, his parents, advocate for him. But it really upsets me that there are so many mentally ill people who are alone, and can not advocate for themselves, jump through all the bureaticatic hoops by themselves, fill out the contiuous stream of forms, etc., fall through the cracks and end up on the streets, or with less help than they are entitled to, and they have no idea they are entitled to it.

I hope those good scientists are working all the time to get some better meds for you soon.
I am in my 50's and just found out that low dose valium is the medicine that stops my Tourette's jerking. All the other meds recomended by Dr.'s all these years, like Haldol with it's tartive diskinesia, were just unacceptable or useless!

Try to set as many of your worries as you can in a pile by your door. Give your brain and soul a rest. The worries will still be there if you feel like picking a few of them back up later.
Regards,
Melanie

Posted by: Melanie Bigelow at May 29, 2004 05:00 PM

I was wondering why your "comments counter" is showing (0) when I have left some comments on some of your postings.

Posted by: Melanie Bigelow at June 1, 2004 09:09 PM

Post a comment

Please enter this code to enable your comment -
Remember Me?