Amid the ongoing debate to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, a mother whose son has been hospitalized for a rare disorder has shared a photo of his astronomical hospital bill on Twitter.
The picture follows a thread in which Alison Chandra, a nurse in Boston, explains the medical condition of her three-year-old son Ethan and how things would have been if her son did not have health insurance. First posted on June 24, the image has since gone viral on the social media site, with at least 55,000 shares and more than 80,000 favorites.
Ethan's Case
Ethan was born with a rare medical disorder known as heterotaxy syndrome: he has nine congenital heart defects and the placement of his internal organs are on the wrong side of his body.
For instance, Ethan has two left lungs, his gallbladder and his liver are in the middle of his body along with his heart, and his stomach is on the right side instead of the left, said Alison.
This year, Ethan underwent an open-heart surgery that would have cost his family to pay a whopping $231,000 in medical expenses. Thanks to the ACA or ObamaCare, however, Alison only had to shelve out $500 for her son's hospital bill.
This was not the first time that Ethan had to go through an open-heart surgery. According to Alison, if calculated in total cost, Ethan's medical bills would amount to more than $1 million.
She said that ever since Ethan was born, he has needed treatment, and as long as he is sick, their family would have to pay for his medical care.
The young boy has been diagnosed as functionally asplenic, meaning he has been prescribed with prophylactic antibiotics for the rest of his life to protect against sepsis, which threatens kids like him, said Alison. Ethan currently takes five prescription medicines several times a day.
What The Viral Photo Says About TrumpCare
If the ACA is repealed and replaced by the American Health Care Act, however, Alison fears that her son's medical treatment could quickly become unaffordable, leaving Ethan without medical coverage.
The Republican-led AHCA proposes to place limit federal Medicaid reimbursements and cut the program by billions of dollars. It would also abolish the provision that requires individuals to have insurance and leave 49 million Americans uninsured by 2050, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
"A lifetime cap on benefits is the same as saying, 'Sorry, you're not worth keeping alive anymore. You're just too expensive,'" said Alison.
Alison said the AHCA makes it seem like children like Ethan are being reduced to a line in a budget.
"No one seems to realize there are real people behind it," she added.
Meanwhile, Senator Bernie Sanders, who ran for president in 2016, criticized the AHCA for being "immoral."
"The reality is that this so-called 'health care' bill is nothing more than a massive transfer of wealth from working families to the very rich," said Sanders.
