More than 126 million people in the US – nearly half the population – had no dental coverage in 2012, according to the US National Association of Dental Plans. In 2007, the New York State Dental Journal reported that while only one-tenth of general physician costs were paid out of pocket, nearly half of all dental costs were settled directly by patients. This reflects spending by the uninsured but also those sharing costs with coverage providers; most plans cover routine cleanings but leave patients to pay for 20 to 50 per cent of fillings, crowns and other big-ticket visits. For those who can’t afford to pay that difference, treatment is delayed and teeth continue to degrade.
But expense isn’t the only barrier to dental care. Those on Medicaid find that few dentists participate in the programme due to its low payout. And more than 45 million people in the US live in areas, often rural or impoverished, with dentist shortages, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services. Medicare, as a general rule, doesn’t include dental.
In the past year, the Affordable Care Act, or ‘ObamaCare’, has changed many lives for the better – mine included. But its omission of dental coverage, a result of political compromise, is a dangerous, absurd compartmentalisation of health care, as though teeth are apart from and less important than the rest of the body.
Здоровые зубы - привелегия богатых и успешных. Бедные люди с больными зубами, просто не могут быть вхожи в общество успешных со здоровыми зубами. И здоровье зубов зависит от достатка. Почти половина населения США не имела зубной страховки в 2012. Если услуги врача напрямую оплачивались только 10% пациентов, за зубы наличкой и из кармана платила половина людей. Даже те у кого есть страховка плятят от 20 до 50% стоимости услуг наличкой из своего кармана. И речь не только о мостах и коронках - просто за композитные пломбы и чистку каналов. Медикейд мало кто принимает, а Медикэр вообще не покрывает зубы - пенсионерам зубы уже не нужны.
Ну и напконец вот это, немного про воробуржуев, у которых "бедные виноваты в своей бедности":
My family’s distress over our teeth – what food might hurt or save them, whether having them pulled was a mistake – reveals the psychological hell of having poor teeth in a rich, capitalist country: the underprivileged are priced out of the dental-treatment system yet perversely held responsible for their dental condition. It’s a familiar trick in the privatisation-happy US – like, say, underfunding public education and then criticising the institution for struggling. Often, bad teeth are blamed solely on the habits and choices of their owners, and for the poor therein lies an undue shaming.