Editor’s Note: The following is a letter sent to Ron du Bois, co-founder of Oklahomans for Universal Health Care. He is a regular contributor to The Oklahoma Observer and lives in Stillwater, OK.

BY EMBREE McDERMID

I had an argument with a golf cart over a year ago. I cut my arm and did serious damage to my right leg. I was taken to the hospital where I stayed for two months. The orthopedic surgeon told me I had broken my tibia and that my knee was a total mess.

A special brace was made for me which I wore day and night for 6 months. When I left the hospital I was loaned a wheel chair at no charge. I did have to rent or buy some equipment for the bathroom.

I couldn’t put any weight on the leg until the tibia healed.

Home Care came in four times a week to fix lunch or supper or heat up meals, another came to bathe me once a week, another to wash and clean the apartment every second week.

Once out of the hospital, and the tibia had healed, I started therapy to try and build up the muscles so they would hold up for a knee replacement. I then had the knee replacement surgery which included a shaft down the leg.

Now months later I still am taking therapy. I continue to have individual one hour sessions, twice a week.

Also, they gave me a Handicap Permit so that I can park close to entrances.

I am now looking after myself except for the lady that comes in to do the washing and the cleaning.

There are also follow up appointments with the surgeon. In addition, while I was in hospital for more than two months for the surgery… all medication was administered free of charge including a blood pressure pill which I have taken for some time.

Anyway, Ron, can you imagine how much this would cost in the U.S.? Yet in Canada no one sees a medical bill! Everyone is covered through public taxation, available to all as a birthright regardless of ability to pay. There is no such thing as medical bankruptcy here. We pay a fraction of the GDP of Americans and it covers everyone from birth to death.

I sent your letter to a high school grad who lives in California and he doesn’t understand the thinking of Americans who associate our plan with Communism. Most Canadians [96%] can’t understand why Americans don’t want what we have!

– The author lives in Winnipeg