For the Land of the Free, and the Home of the Helpless?
8/19/08
This past Tuesday, August 12th, Oprah Winfrey had Oscar-winning filmmaker Michael Moore on her show to discuss his documentary on the healthcare industry called Sicko. The film compares the American healthcare system with those of countries that have universal healthcare - and brings to light the hardships faced by patients who thought their medical needs would be covered by their insurance. The movie and the Oprah segment highlight story after story of sick Americans who did not get the care they needed because 1) they did not have insurance and cannot afford medical care or 2) their insurance company decided not to cover their medical expenses or to only partially cover their expenses and they could not afford the necessary treatments. Some of these people are now dead because they did not get medical care.
One story that has attracted a lot of attention was told at the August 2007 Democratic presidential debate in Illinois. Retired steelworker Steve Skvara, disabled by multiple sclerosis, stood up with tears in his eyes and said the following to the candidates: "After 34 years with LTV Steel, I was forced to retire because of a disability. Two years later, LTV filed bankruptcy. I lost a third of my pension, and my family lost their healthcare. Every day of my life, I sit at the kitchen table across from the woman who devoted 36 years of her life to my family, and I can't afford to pay for her healthcare. What's wrong with America, and what will you do to change it?"
Steve Skvara got a standing ovation at that convention because he speaks for so many Americans. After that emotional moment, Mr. Skvara was actually contacted by the head of a medical group who was so moved that he decided to cover Mr. Skvara and his wife's medical expenses for free. Steve Skvara stood up in Oprah's audience and said, "I'd like to thank them at this time and you for this show, because it's not about a retiree and his wife. It's about almost 50 million people in this country that are doing without," referring to the estimated 47 million Americans who do not have health insurance.
Truthfully, my heart bleeds for Steve Skvara and for all of the people in all of the horrifically tragic stories presented by Michael Moore. Yet my heart does not bleed for them because they are victims of a horrible healthcare system. Have you looked at Haiti or Bangladesh lately? Now those are horrible healthcare systems! And I know Michael Moore absolutely loves places like Canada and Great Britain for their universal healthcare, but I will explain later why these are not all they are cracked up to be. My heart bleeds for these people because they have bought into the learned helplessness that our medical and pharmaceutical companies have taught us. That the only way to deal with disease is through conventional medicine and pharmaceutical drugs. What I want to impart to these people who are "suffering" from degenerative diseases, is that one's healing and freedom begins the moment they choose it. All you need is to be able to afford food, be able to read, and have an open mind and you can begin to heal yourself. All of the information one needs about healing is in a book that is available in this country. (Unfortunately, there are people in this country who cannot afford food and/or cannot read. That's really where I believe we have dropped the ball as a nation.)
You see, I AM one of the 47 million uninsured Americans and I am not a victim! I know there are others out there like me who agree that our bodies have a brilliant ability to heal when we give them what they need to do so and refuse to pay exorbitant amounts of money for horrendous care. It is my belief that we are seriously barking up the wrong tree on the healthcare issue. Universal healthcare is not the answer to our woes. Universal personal responsibility is. The only savior you have is the person you see in the mirror every morning, and you have more power than you know with regard to affecting personal healing.
Why don't we start with the example of Steve Skvara who suffers from multiple sclerosis. One of the major causes of multiple sclerosis (MS), a disease involving the central nervous system, is heavy metal toxicity. Steve Skvara worked for 34 years with a steel company. . .it seems entirely possible during that time that he was exposed to toxic levels of heavy metals, right? People with MS are advised by holistic practitioners to change all metal dental fillings to non-metal materials. They are also advised to avoid foods that act as neurotoxins on the body such as aspartame and monosodium glutamate (MSG). Add to that the fact that we need to eat certain fats to build up the myelin sheaths that surround our nerves. Has Steve Skvara been advised of any of this? Probably not. Will any of this help him? One never knows until one tries, but I can guarantee that working on eliminating toxins from his system and rebuilding his body with good nutrition will work better than complaining about healthcare in America or reflecting on his life with despair and helplessness. One can read about these and other alternative remedies in Kevin Trudeau's Natural Cures They Don't Want You to Know About. I pray that one day Mr. Skvara will know that he holds the power to start his healing.
What about Mr. Skvara's dear wife who suffers from rheumatoid arthritis? Has anyone advised her that eating food with gluten (wheat, rye, oats and barley) is a major cause of this type of arthritis? The chemical composition of the protein in gluten containing foods resembles that of our synovium, a material in our joints. This protein will be assimilated into our joints yet is seen as an invader and as such, the body starts to attack itself. This happens when we eat any number of poisons including sugar and pesticides which the body sees as invaders and begins to attack. If these substances are lodged in your joints, you will experience a lot of pain as I'm sure Mrs. Skvara is experiencing. Anyone with rheumatoid arthritis should strictly avoid gluten, sugar, non-organic or genetically modified (GM) foods and should drink lots of water and take an Omega 3 fatty acid supplement. One can learn about this and other nutritional hazards in Paul Chek's audio series You Are What You Eat (available at www.chekinstitute.com). In addition, there is mounting evidence that gardening, walking barefoot in the grass, and other direct interactions with the earth help people with arthritis get out of pain. This type of information which is so crucial to the healing process, is usually ignored, overlooked, or frowned upon in the medical community. Will this information solve all her health woes? At the very least it will help lessen her pain, but it is entirely possible that she could heal her herself completely with only this knowledge.
My point is, can we at least begin as a nation to open up the discussion of personal responsibility to educate oneself about one's healing? In my opinion, it is not unconscionable that our government will not pay for our drugs. It is unconscionable to keep information about natural healing from the citizens of this country that are sick. It is pointless for Americans to complain along with Michael Moore when there is so much information about healing on all levels (physical, emotional, mental and spiritual) available to us. I'm hoping you've seen "The Secret" by now and are accepting that what you complain about, you have an unconscious intention to attract.
In the Oprah segment, Princeton University professor Uwe Reinhardt, one of the nation's leading authorities on healthcare economics who is in favor of universal healthcare, says the healthcare debate all boils down to a single question. "Should the child of a gas station attendant have the same chance of staying healthy or getting cured as the child of a corporate executive?" The answer of course is yes, everyone should have the same chance to experience health. What I am suggesting is that as long as that gas station attendant can afford food, and read (even if he only reads Spanish), that child does have the same chance if not greater than the executive's child who eats junk food and takes antibiotics for every cough and sneeze. How can this be?
1) Food is medicine. Plain and simple. Every time a person eats sugar, his immune system is suppressed for up to 6 hours. You are only as alive as the food you are eating so if you are eating processed foods you will have the vitality of a Twinkie. Organic food, on the other hand, gives our body what it needs to heal. If you can afford food, you can afford organic food. Yes you can. I understand that you may have to make cut backs on some luxury items. Organic food is NOT a luxury item, it is essential to the maintenance of health.
2) There are books out there on every disease and how people have healed themselves naturally. Whether they had cancer, HIV, heart disease, diabetes, or any other infectious or degenerative disease, you can find literature by practitioners who know how to heal them naturally. Many of these books are available in Spanish as well. So as long as you have the ability to read in ANY language, you can begin the healing process.
On that note, I would like to use a story of immense triumph to illustrate what I am talking about. This is the true story of Pilar De Los Rios, my best friend Isabel's mother.
Pilar De Los Rios is a Hispanic immigrant who came to this country from Chile barely speaking English and with only a high school education. She worked for years in menial, thankless, miserable jobs, but worked nonetheless to provide a good life for her family. She finally had a stroke in her forties and also suffered from runaway diabetes (which is now pandemic in the Latino-American community). Pilar received disability benefits as she could no longer work, but continued to decline in health until finally her kidneys shut down in her late fifties and she needed to begin renal dialysis to save her life. For those who don't know, dialysis is a process that cleans one's blood for patients who no longer have functioning kidneys. The patient has to go to the dialysis center 3 times every week for about 4 hours to get this done and is usually very weak and demoralized by the whole experience. Pilar's only chance of coming off dialysis would be if a kidney became available that was compatible with her body. If no kidney became available she would have to spend the rest of her life going to weekly dialysis.
Knowing that her only option at this point was to surrender and pray, Pilar began to bring uplifting and healing literature with her to dialysis. After all, she was just sitting there for hours, why not make the most of it? She began to collect all sorts of Self-Help and New Age literature in Spanish including: The Conversations With God series, Joel Osteen's books, Wayne Dyer's Power of Intention, Louise Hay's You Can Heal Your Life, Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now and many others. For four years, Pilar read book after book in Spanish about spirituality and healing while she underwent dialysis (Pilar did not read any nutrition books because her daughter Isabel is a CHEK-certified nutritionist. It is imperative that people who are ill either hire a qualified nutrition professional or begin reading about nutrition on their own. Please visit my website www.theorganicexperiencenyc.com for more information on Nutrition and Lifestyle coaching programs).
After four years of inspirational reading, a kidney finally became available (surprise, surprise). Equipped with her new belief in affirmations and a positive attitude, a very physically weak Pilar went into surgery and affirmed, "Everything is going to be fine. I am going to come out of this stronger than I went in. I am going to take care of my body to the best of my ability because I know God is giving me a second chance."
The surgery was very successful and before Pilar left the hospital, she and Isabel met with the hospital Registered Dietician (RD). To Isabel's horror and dismay, the hospital RD recommended her mother follow a diet of cereal and skim milk in the morning, pasta or rice with lunch and dinner, Ensure shakes as snacks, aspartame-laden treats and processed diabetic protein bars. Knowing that such a diet would slowly kill her overweight diabetic mother, Isabel forbade her from following the RD's recommendations. Instead she had her mother follow a diet for her metabolic type (Pilar is a protein type) of all organic food. Pilar eats lots of organic eggs, meat, poultry, fish, fruit, vegetables, coconut oil, butter, olive oil, nuts and drinks lots of water. She will absolutely not even touch sugar, alcohol, gluten, pasteurized dairy, caffeine or food with chemicals. Pilar is now 65 years old and wakes up every morning and does some type of movement be it walking, stretching or weight training. Pilar doesn't sweat the small stuff and knows that moving about her day in a peaceful way is the only way to keep her newfound health.
Within six months of her surgery Pilar was taken off her cholesterol medication, blood pressure medication, blood thinners, insulin shots and stool softeners, and has lost 40 lbs. The only medication she is still on is the anti-rejection medication for her kidneys. Her doctors are baffled and amazed as all of the other transplant patients are still very sick and very overweight. Pilar drives around in an old beat up car, and when asked if she wants to get a new one always says "no" because she knows that affording organic food is the only way she will remain healthy. Pilar used to get winded walking from one end of her house to the other. This year she bounded out the door when the DJ at her oldest daughter's wedding announced her and danced the night away. Every person that has seen Pilar's transformation is forever changed and awed by the power of holistic lifestyle changes. Pilar De Los Rios is not a millionaire who went to one of these celebrity health camps to get healthy. She is a regular person armed only with her books, her faith, her local Whole Foods Market, some light free weights and a mat, and the help of a CHEK practitioner. She is a gleaming example to sick Americans everywhere.
Isabel De Los Rios has since published an E-book called "The Diet Solution," for people looking to lose weight and get healthy for good. This book is phenomenal and has all the tools that her mother Pilar, and many other people, have used to escape the clutches of the medical and pharmaceutical industries and live a full and vital life. It's also one of the best weight loss books I've ever read. Click Here! for more information about "The Diet Solution."
OK back to healthcare. To actually get universal healthcare coverage for every man, woman and child in the United States, Professor Reinhardt believes it would cost about $100 billion in additional government spending. Guess where that money would come from folks. The good old taxpayers. How many of us would love for our taxes to go up to pay for universal care? Oh wait, Professor Reinhardt then goes on to say that's about as much money as we spend in 9 months in Iraq. Good luck getting us to pull out of Iraq in favor of healthcare. Michael Moore said he actually would pay more in taxes if it meant getting healthcare for people like me. But he makes millions so if his taxes went up, he'd still be living the good life. And even in countries like England, Scotland and Canada where there is universal healthcare, sometimes patients have to wait up to 18 months for care, and substandard care at that. While you could die in America because your insurance company believes making a huge profit is more important than your life, you could die just as easily in England because the care you get is too little and too late. Let's not kid ourselves, when it comes to healthcare, if you can pay, you can play no matter where you are.
Many citizens like me who are certainly not in Michael Moore's income tax bracket would prefer to spend that money on preventative care in the form of organic food, supplements, alternative treatments like acupuncture and colonics, and exercise. I promise you the return on investment of preventative care beats that of palliative care anyday. I do not wish to have my taxes raised to pay for the repercussions of other people's cigarette smoking, junk food habits, sedentary lifestyle, 70-hour work week or alcohol/drug abuse. Especially when people like Pilar De Los Rios are reclaiming their health everyday and much better than any doctor or drug could do for them.
Truly if we all did our part to take a little bit better care of ourselves and stopped relying on the system, maybe our country would actually be able to support our medical needs in times of crisis, like the 9/11 workers who inhaled the noxious air at Ground Zero and are now sick. Michael Moore so dramatically took a few of the sick 9/11 workers who did not get the medical care they needed in the U.S., to Cuba where they got treated much more compassionately and for much cheaper (I don't know how much I really believe this but bear with me for a moment). Would our government be able to care for our heroes if the rest of us did our part to stay strong and well and free up the resources? I'm not an economist so I don't know, but in the end you never lose when you devote time and money to building your health. I admire Michael Moore for the courage it took to take on and expose the health insurance industry. I wish to let everyone know that he does not, however, speak for the 47 million uninsured Americans. At least not this one.