Why do fundies idealise Little Women so much

[Loveday]

Agreed. While modern medicine is overused sometimes (got an energetic kid? have some Ritalin! got a viral infection? have some penicillin!), it also does save lives.

I'm going to be fine because it looks like we'll be able to get the money together. We have the medical/dental technology today to save lives from this condition, but we've still got a major problem in America with people not being able to access care.

The county programs here don't offer services to those who make more than something like $1800/mo for a family of 3 (after taxes, that's enough to scrape by on, never mind come up with over a thousand to take care of a tooth abscess) at a discounted rate. If you qualify for the discounted rate, you're still paying $25 for one x-ray and a basic exam, and an extraction, without an abscess, starts at $40 and goes up depending on tooth and complications, such as an abscess. That's what you pay if you're under the federal poverty line (this area I'm in takes more income than the poverty limit for a family to scrape by). Over the poverty limit and you're bumped up to standard rates.

The dental schools don't deal with emergencies, and getting appointments can take weeks, and they only take those with issues that their students need to practice on. The rates are 60%-70% of usual rates, and you can expect two appointments, each taking several hours, first the exam to determine course of treatment, then the treatment itself. If you can't afford the rate, then you don't get the treatment and the student doesn't get to practice. For a tooth abscess, when it requires a root canal instead of extraction (some extractions require further expensive treatments to prevent other problems, and with the location of my abscessed tooth, I'd have to have a bone graft to keep my other teeth from shifting into the spot and causing a bunch of major issues), that still means several hundred dollars you have to have,

Since an abscess isn't something that can wait for several months, if you can't come up with the money, even for an extraction, your option is to go to an emergency room where they can sometimes remove teeth for several hundred and bill you afterward, but then you need to come up with the money to not only pay that, but to pay for the resulting problems, if you're someone like me who has one of the worst possible teeth abscess where a canal ends up being the least expensive treatment.

I haven't even had the canal, and we've already spent about $400 out of pocket between appointments I've had to try to get it under control and the medications I've had to buy out of pocket and a mouth guard I have to wear over my front teeth to keep the teeth in back from touching and causing searing pain for the abscessed tooth. I'm luckier than many because we had a bit of savings to buy the medicines, though it's drained our savings. Without the medicines, especially the antibiotics that finally worked (no generic version), I'd probably be in the hospital right now. I'm also luckier because I just got approved for a program that will cover part of the cost, leaving us only having to come up with $700, which isn't chump change, but is less than we'd have to come up with otherwise, and I still have enough of the narcotic drugs to get me through, though I do have to team it with some sleeping pills to boost the effect a bit, though it does mean I'm sleeping a lot, but I can't handle the full pain.

So while I'll be okay, it's taking some fairly extreme financial measures on our part (not only draining our entire savings, but some things we're having to sell cheaply to get the money fast enough) and a major stroke of luck with that program covering part of it.

While we have the care available in this country, there's still a major problem of access to that care. People are still dying today because of the problem of access. Tennessee's ERs last year had FIVE TIMES as many people come in for dental problems as people come in for any burns, people who couldn't afford dentists and were in such severe pain they needed pain meds and antibiotics to buy them time.

And our lovely, Christ-like fundies are out there ranting and railing against the mere idea of care for all.... And now I'm really pissed off. I was feeling mellow, but not anger has filled me again.

I'm glad you're going to be all right. Mine wasn't as bad--it was just a cracked tooth that got infected and required a root canal and then a crown (followed by months of paying off the bill). God-awful pain but not as prolonged or complicated as yours. I wish some of those 'Christ-like' fundies could read your post--but then, I doubt it would make a difference to their thinking. That doesn't seem to happen very often. :angry-banghead:

[Hane]

One reason certain fundies prefer Anne over Little Women: L.M. Montgomery and Anne were Presbyterians; Alcott and Little Women were Unitarians, hence not Christians in the strictest sense.

[Elle]

I'm glad you're going to be all right. Mine wasn't as bad--it was just a cracked tooth that got infected and required a root canal and then a crown (followed by months of paying off the bill). God-awful pain but not as prolonged or complicated as yours. I wish some of those 'Christ-like' fundies could read your post--but then, I doubt it would make a difference to their thinking. That doesn't seem to happen very often. :angry-banghead:

I wish mine was straight-foward. A previous dentist botched a filling in that tooth, twice, and it turned out didn't drill out all of the cavity. So there was still a cavity under the filling. To buy time, a county dentist started a root canal (all they're technically allowed to do are basic fillings and extractions), but it turns out that when a canal is started, few dentists will touch it because it's somehow more complicated. The one dental office in the area that takes payments (for a hefty down payment, equal to what I'll be paying in total at this other place, plus a year of payments at something like $107 per month, might be $108, I don't feel like finding the estimate I got before finding out they wouldn't do it anyway) will only do straight-forward canals, and only with the start of an abscess.

I'm still lucky that I got into a program that's going to help, and that I have things I can sacrifice to make the money we still need. A lot of people don't. The name-brand-only antibiotics weren't cheap, and not everyone can spare the money we could (good thing we had a little bit of savings, which I know not everyone can say these days). There are many others out there needing help who have no way to get it and will have to wait until an ER can't turn them away and has to admit them for IV antibiotics while trying to find someone with any experience removing teeth, though there's nothing they can do if it's a tooth in a location that will cause problems by removing it. Then the fundies whine and bitch about how that person is a leach and stealing from people for not suffering in silence or magically coming up with the money to pay out of pocket.

I'll bet most fundies get charity care themselves and lie about it. Sometimes I wonder how many really believe what they say and how many don't believe it but don't want to be ostracized by saying something against the mainstream belief and so get help in secret. Remember we only hear from those fortunate enough to have computers and internet access, and many of those we see have really nice, really large homes even by non-fundy standards, but we also know that many, maybe most, fundies with scads of kids and just one wage-earner are struggling badly and a computer and the internet are major luxuries. So we won't be reading their stories anytime soon. Those are the ones I worry about the most, the men too. They're more likely to be so poorly educated themselves that they don't realize rebelling is an option and that the outside world at large will accept someone deflecting from a lifestyle that says women are property and have all the kids you can even if you can't feed them. Our wealthier fundies have the privilege of accessing the internet to see what mainstream society says and to realize they can leave the lifestyle and not be treated poorly by everyone like those in the back hills are probably told.

[Wolfie]

Yes, unfortunately. I'm so sorry you're going through that. :( I've only had one other medical situation as bad as a tooth abscess, and that was a kidney stone a few years ago. You have my full sympathy, I hope you don't have to wait too much longer for that appointment.

I was about to compare the two, I'm not sure which was worse.