Letters to the Editor

Mail letters to Letters, Santa Fe Reporter, PO Box 2306, Santa Fe NM 87504, deliver them to 132 E. Marcy St., fax them to 988-5348, e-mail them to editor@sfreporter.com, or use our online form.


   BUREAUCRACY ILLS  

Regarding the Aug. 22 cover story, "

": My first job after my pediatric training was with the Indian Health Service. My fellow trainees felt sorry for me: The government would limit my ability to practice medicine as I saw fit, right? Not so, as it turned out.

We had a limited formulary of medications. But if we felt a child needed a medication not on the formulary, we could get the needed drug rapidly after explaining the medical need to the medical chief. We needed approval for expensive tests, like MRIs, but again, medical need was the determining factor. This was a single-payer health system-not universal, but universal for all Native Americans with tribal affiliation. This was 25 years ago, just prior to the invasion of "managed care."

***image1***Fast forward 25 years. The patient arrives at a clinic or doctor's office. The front desk personnel must determine if the patient's insurance covers the use of this particular clinic. Is the insurance still in effect? How much is the co-pay this year? Front desk personnel contacts the insurance company to get these questions answered.

The doctor sees the patient and orders tests or a referral to a specialist. Phone calls to the insurance company ensue: What testing facilities are covered by the insurance company? What specialists? The process is repeated at the specialist's office. Their staff must call the insurance company to verify coverage.

Later, the patient receives an EOB (Explanation of Benefits) form in the mail from the insurance company and bills from each office for the amounts not covered by insurance. Maybe these amounts don't make sense. The patient must call the insurance company to try to figure it out. Maybe the diagnosis isn't covered. Maybe the charge was entered incorrectly. Maybe the claim will be re-submitted.

Picture all the money spent creating a barrier between a person and his or her health care. The insurance company pays the salaries of all those people who answer the phone calls. Our insurance premiums help pay for their salaries, for the office buildings in which they work, for the electricity that lights those office buildings, for the paper and postage for those EOB forms. Likewise, each medical clinic and facility must pay for the salaries and related infrastructure for the personnel whose job it is to wrangle with the insurance companies.

What if the bureaucracy-all those people in all those offices calling all those people in all those other offices-were eliminated? With the money saved, we could provide comprehensive health care to everyone. Everyone. Voters must understand that if we are truly to provide good health care to everyone, we must take the insurance company bureaucracy out of the equation.

JENNIFER JOHNSON, MD
SANTA FE


   WRITE IT PROPERLY  

I always had supposed that people who write for newspapers and those who edit are trained in English, but have found that quite often that is sadly not the case.

I call to your attention the article by Melissa White on Christopher Youngblood Tucker [Outtakes, Aug. 15: "

"]. In the answer to the sixth question there is the peculiar locution of "nerve-racking." I suspect you meant "nerve-wracking." Wrack is from the same root as wrought and rack means to stack.

The fourteenth question reads, "Where does your interest and excitement..." This obviously should read, "Where do your interest and excitement..."

If professional writers and editors can't spell and use proper grammar, this does not augur well for our schoolchildren and the literacy of our society.

RICHARD ABELES
SANTA FE

Editor's Note:
Consultation with several dictionaries defines "nerve-racking" as extremely trying on the nerves and "nerve-wracking" as an acceptable variant.

   DEMOCRATIC VOTERS  

I agree with Karen Wening [Letters, Aug. 15: "

"] regarding the Voter ID Law. She states that the Bush administration wants to "specifically target a slice of the population most likely to vote Democratic, with the specific intention of thwarting their effort to vote." After all, if the Democrats can't count on the vote of criminals, illegal immigrants and dead people (the only folks who might have a problem with obtaining a voter ID card) they might not ever win another election.

JERRY MAURO
PUEBLO, COLO.

   REMEMBERING BRAD  

Rather belatedly I would like to thank you for running the article about Brad ***image2***Will [Cover story, Aug. 8: "

"] I well remember the shock that went through the activist community when he was brutally murdered. Thank you for pointing out the political nature of his death and the true story of what went on in Oaxaca-a story assiduously ignored or misrepresented in the mainstream press. Progressive change is being violently assaulted on all sides-Oaxaca then, America soon.

DIANA L THATCHER
SANTA FE


   IRAN IS A THREAT  

Ms. Pollon's writing is sophomoric and bears little resemblance to the facts. In her article, [First Person, Aug. 15: "

"], she facetiously remarks: "We are told" that Iran is a threat to the world. We certainly are told exactly that. We are told that by Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad himself. On many occasions he has declared his intentions to "wipe Israel off the map" in addition to promoting the death of all infidels. Not necessarily the words of a peace-loving diplomat.

Is Hamas a "terrorist" organization? They blatently murder Jews, Palestinians, Christians, and fellow Muslims, all with reckless abandon.

Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran want to terrorize all women by subjugating them, refusing them an education, murdering them when they are raped for bringing disgrace to the family and brutalizing them with the savage practice of clitorectomy.

What is Ms. Pollon's motivation for defending these animals?

ALAN H LANGER
LAMY


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Letters to the Editor

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