The thievery of health care

I just had $710 stolen from me by St. Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital. Could you afford that much money if the services performed were absolutely needed? Such a scenario should not be necessary in today’s world of health care.

Two days before I was set to move into my John Jay dorm on Aug. 26, I was staying with a cousin up on 145th Street when I came down with a serious case of strep throat. I’m talking swollen throat, headache, back pain... the works. Better yet, I was moving into my dorm in two days for an intense, four-day biking trip with the Columbia Outdoor Orientation Program. Needless to say, I needed some help.

In the middle of the night, I went to Columbia Health Services in hopes of receiving medical attention with the use of my not-yet-active insurance provided by the university, as my dad did not have health insurance for me before I came to Columbia. However, I was not living on campus yet and had not been given a student ID; therefore, I was refused at the door.

Since my cousin was still working at his restaurant, and the urgent care clinic I had called was private, I had no choice but to jump in a cab and ask the driver to take me to St. Luke’s. Looking back, I probably could have finagled my way into St. Luke’s Hospital and claimed to be a student who had lost his ID, but the ever-increasing throbbing in between my eyes skewed my already lacking street savvy.

Nevertheless, I arrived at the hospital sometime past midnight and, after a few hours of waiting (during which my mind was diverted from my pain by an elderly lady cursing at a nurse and running out of her room with blood spewing from her arms), a nice middle-aged, male doctor confirmed my suspicions and diagnosed me with strep throat.

I thought that all my troubles were taken care of after another nice man swiped away $334 from my debit card, but all these nice people were only veils for the copious amounts of stress, bills, and thievery of which I was about to become a victim.

I say thievery because at no point was I informed that I would receive two more bills from Roosevelt Hospital totaling $710. Furthermore, there is no record of the $334 I already paid, which leads to a whole other story of phone calls and repetitive hold tones.

Say someone ate at a restaurant, paid the bill and, as they are walking towards the door, was approached by a waiter saying that they owed more money despite nothing on the menu indicating any more cost than what they already paid (especially for a bad sandwich). Would this not be considered a thievery of sorts? If not thievery, a slimy trickery at best.

Why is our health care system allowed to freely victimize unsuspecting patients like so? Also, why was I refused at Columbia Health Services despite the fact that I was about to begin school in less than a week and was already a paying student?

Before this incident, I was pretty indifferent towards the debate on health care, but I am now a strong advocate for reform. Despite the fact that I knew I had strep throat, I could not get a prescription for the proper medication without seeing a doctor, which resulted in a $710 bill.

The United States is the only developed nation to not have a universal health care system. Instead, they charge a financially struggling college student $710 for less than five minutes of medical attention, two ibuprofen pills, and an antibiotic. Try and tell me that doesn’t spell reform. What a warm welcome to New York.

The author is a first-year at Columbia College.