UNCOVERED

Secret scandals are uncovers by investigators. Lost civilizations are uncovered by anthropologists. Hidden oil fields are uncovered by geophysicists. Sound sleepers are uncovered by restless leg syndrome sufferers. This piece isn’t about them.

For twenty years my daily drug intake included a cornucopia of highly toxic anticonvulsants. They weren’t very good at stopping convulsions, but as it turns out they were quite good at hiding the steady onset of arthritis and disc problems (spinal, not compact). Neurosurgery finally freed me from both seizures and the need for heavy medication, but it uncovered a world of pain. This piece isn’t about that either.

At first I thought it was just age (60 is not the new 20, I don’t care what they say) and I tried to cope, living on a daily handful of aspirin. Wrong! I finally went to my doctor and begged him to take out the magic pen. He wrote me a prescription for Celebrex, saying I should give it a try, and casually adding, “It’s uncovered, you know.” This is what the piece is about.

It went right over my head. By the time I was in my car I realized that what he had probably meant was “not covered.” But how could that be? I had excellent insurance through the Screen Actors Guild. They had paid out a ton of money for years of medication, and over $60,000 for my operation. They’re not gonna pay for a few pain pills? Please - he’s wrong.

Only when I went to fill the prescription did I find out how right he was. A month’s supply of Celebrex costs $200. That’s $2400 a year to alleviate one of the most common sources of pain in the largest portion of the population. Mobic, on the other hand, another arthritis pain reliever, cost only $10 (I haven’t tried it yet).

“What’s the difference,” I asked the pharmacist? “Well,” she told me, “a lot of research went into Celebrex.” So, did they find Mobic under a rock? It’s worth remembering that the real money in pharmaceuticals isn’t in curing patients, it’s in treating them. If you cure them, they have no reason to come back. I don’t mean to imply that the pharmaceutical industry is some sort of evil entity, only that it is an industry, and the purpose of industry is to benefit the owners by making money.

There is no doubt that the American public is being raped by the American business community, the pharmaceutical industry just being a prominent example. America’s special brand of free market enterprise not only allows manufacturers to screw consumers six ways from Sunday, it encourages it, as long as it’s within the law. And since big business pays the bulk of campaign costs for legislators, who in turn create the laws, you can bet that the majority of screwing will be legal.

Virtually every other industrialized western nation has instituted some form of universal health care. What has been uncovered in America is a reining in of moral standards, and unbridled greed.

a foot on either side