It is October, but I am thinking about December. 14 years ago, this December, we got a call from Dallas’ closest uncle, Bert, who was a physician professionally and, personally, a hero in the Smith family. He was a strong, handsome, defiant smoker. While Bert had lung cancer a few years earlier, .this time it had returned with a vengeance. He had been in a hospital in Birmingham supposedly for back surgery, which was when they found the mass. They were deciding what to do. Bert was in pain and the protocol demanded pain meds every 4 hours. His response was that “his pain did not show up every four hours…”

Frustrated, he had himself checked out of the hospital and, in an ambulance, had himself taken home to die. When we heard about it, the prognosis was grim. “Single digit days,” they said. He was still in pain. One nephew, a physician, said that it was over…

The other nephew, also a physician, began administering massive doses of steroids, which not only relieved the inflammation that was causing lots of pain, but also perked him up. Bert proceeded to have the best “live” wake one could hope for…for 60 days. Everyone came to see him. He smoked, He drank (although with some restraint)…and the steroids plus pain meds did the job. We were able to speak to him up until the last two days.
I tell this story because the use of steroids, here, was called the “Medical last rights.” It was a hormonal injection that, under other circumstances, would make someone a very sick Superman, causing havoc with everything from brain function to bone loss..to many other symptoms that would eventually be lethal. However, in the case of an already dying patient, steroids are preferred…as the patient will not live long enough to experience the terrible side effects.
Well, I look at the economy having metastasized cancer and wondering if what Congress did was inject the Economic Last Rights. I wonder if all of these billions of dollars..more than anyone can fathom…is expected to be curative or only provide limited symptomatic relief. I wonder if anyone looking at this was willing to accept that the economic rules under which we have been living have rendered the system terminal. Rather than accepting that and looking beyond the obvious, we inject more of the currency that has made the system ill: more debt and more denial.

The impact this will have on the healthcare systems is stunning. Millions of people out of work and each of them without health insurance, at risk for the stress unemployment causes, and the systems not acknowledging the human
cost of this breakdown. I am at a loss to know which way this will go. I am also not sure how it ³should² go. All I can think about is Uncle Bert and the miracle of steroids giving us two months. And, then he died. Just like they said he would.

The economy has been symptomatic for a long time, not unlike the smoker whose cough became ³normal² It had been blamed on the cost of healthcare (remember?). The challenges of small businesses has been how to provide health insurance for its employees that both the company and employee can afford. And yet, at the same time, the whole financial systems have been on one huge and long binge. I could say, without guilt, that this has been a binge with frequent black outs, inappropriate behavior, lots of enablers, and, further, the outcome is the same: We have to all admit that we are powerless over the money holders and our own lives are now unmanageable.

I am not sure how this will play out but I do know that healthcare is on the list of what is unmanageable. Please post your comments.