[massivecali]

>Imagine being sick, having no insurance, maybe no job...

Sorry no.

Long term unemployed people in the US qualify for free medical care, celphones and basic dental work. The process is arduous, yes, but it is comprehensive. I had entire recurring blood panels, multiple MRIs, neurological impairment tests , every hospital visit and all of my prescriptions provided for free.

Lumping all levels of poor together is just lies that obfuscates larger issues.

[EliRivers]

Well then, serious question - not just passive-aggressive snark - why does this happen?

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/nov/23/enormous-pop-up...

And other articles too. People inside the USA, travelling ( sometimes for days) to queue (sometimes for days) for a dentist. Why are there organistations in the US whose purpose for existence is to travel around, providing free dental care to any and all comers? Like a medical mission to a country suffering enormous poverty.

[retiredcoder]

I think the cue is at “Virginia is one of 19 states refusing federal dollars to close the healthcare “coverage gap” for people not poor enough for Medicaid, but too poor for anything else.“

[dev_dull]

It’s the working middle class that get soaked.

[mnm1]

What program are you referring to? AFAIK, This is only in states that expanded Medicaid so it's a real situation for millions in states that didn't. Or are you talking about some other program?

[massivecali]

California programs, so yes expanded Medicaid. But as the state that consumes the most in welfare, it seems highly relevant when discussing the needs of the 'poor'.

Programs: California Medi-cal (which covered all of my medications, tests, etc), Denti-cal (all dental work thats not cosmetic), my obama phone, calfresh (for ebt food) and calworks (cash monthly stipend) are the only programs I can speak to.

I'm grateful for what I had to fight to receive during a bad period of my life and hate seeing misrepresentations like this being spread without specific context.

Had I not been able to finally get working again, I would have eventually qualified for free housing, utilities and all the other benefits available from programs that are funded from various sources. I made several friends through the course of going to these offices over a long period of time who were admittedly worse off than me (mentally) but somehow knew all the inside information on how to game the system. (Ex: if you are considered impaired you can get free bus/subway/van service card, which they all knew how to easily acquire). I had to ride my bicycle or walk everywhere to get back and forth from these appointments.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/no-other-state-comes-close...

[mnm1]

I'm glad you were able to get healthcare, but the parent comment you're responding to and your own comment are both talking about the entire US. What you wrote is simply false. There are 14 states that still haven't expanded Medicaid and millions of poor people are without health insurance. California isn't the US and pretending like it is misleading and helps no one.

https://www.kff.org/health-reform/state-indicator/state-acti...