Famous name among Tennessee's uninsured
James Davy Crockett is a descendant of one of Tennessee's most famous politicians, but he doesn't keep up with political gamesmanship.
He's too down on his luck for that. He didn't have access to television to watch as Senate committees struck down Insure Tennessee, the plan proposed by Gov. Bill Haslam that would provide him and 280,000 other Tennesseans with health coverage.
He didn't know his state senator, Steve Southerland, R-Morristown, voted to keep the plan from getting a floor vote.
Crockett was dealing with the death of his father, the loss of the family home in Bulls Gap to foreclosure and the debilitating onset of a disease he knows he's got even though it's not been diagnosed by a specialist. He watched his mother get sick and die with Huntington's disease. The genetic disorder also took his grandmother and his aunt. Cousins with the disease live in nursing homes.
Just the simple act of talking is becoming a struggle for the 38-year-old man who once worked in a factory making practice bombs for the military. He said he is the fifth generation grandson of Davy Crockett, the Tennessee frontiersman who served in Congress and died in the Battle of the Alamo.
"It's a big struggle not having health insurance because all I can do is go to the health department," he said. "They can't test me for anything. It's all I can do."
Friends, including a retired social worker and neighbor who is letting him stay in the living quarters of her horse trailer, have arranged for him to have an appointment at the Huntington's Clinic at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in May. Lynn Boch, the neighbor, said she hopes Crockett will qualify for medical care through a clinical trial.
In the meantime, Crockett tries to cope with the symptoms.
"It will make people think you are drunk," he said. "My speech and my balance is off. That's why I got arrested for DUI. I don't drink or nothing."
He said he's still fighting that charge even though a blood test was negative for alcohol.
Joe Lannom of Lyles doesn't have a famous name. He said he spent his adult life on loading docks, hopping in and out of trucks doing manual labor. He had to stop because of degenerative disc disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other health problems.
Without insurance, he delays the back surgery he needs and rations the use of an inhaler.
"I don't have enough money to see the people I need to see for these different problems," Lannom said.
He couldn't name his state senator off the tip of his tongue, but said he might recognize it from a list of three. Lannom is represented by state Sen. Kerry Roberts, R-Springfield, who voted down Insure Tennessee in a committee meeting, preventing the proposal from getting a floor vote in the February special session called by Haslam.
Many Tennessee legislators oppose the plan because federal funding for Medicaid expansion was made possible by the Affordable Care Act, and they have expressed concerns the state would ultimately end up footing the bill.
Southerland told Citizen Tribune, a Morristown newspaper, that he had questions about whether Tennessee could drop the program. Roberts has said among his concerns was the fact that the state didn't have a written contract with the federal government with a protection clause for Tennessee.
The second time a Senate committee killed Insure Tennessee, Pam Buntin of Hermitage was really sick. The committee killed the proposals on March 31 just as she was being hospitalized for the third time in a year.
Buntin spent 16 days at Nashville General Hospital at Meharry — another bill paid by the taxpayers of Davidson County who subsidize the safety net hospital. She has lupus, diabetes, a lung disorder and scleroderma, a disease that is causing her organs to harden to the point of failure.
Haslam's proposal, Insure Tennessee, would provide health coverage to Buntin and 280,000 other Tennesseans without costing Davidson County or state residents any additional taxes. It would be funded by federal taxes that Americans, including Tennesseans, are already paying.
The Affordable Care Act allows the federal government to pick up the full cost of insuring new people who qualify for Medicaid under the expanded guidelines through 2016. It will then phase down to a permanent 90 percent matching rate in 2020. The Tennessee Hospital Association has agreed to put up the matching money that would be required from the state through an "enhanced coverage fee," which is a voluntary bed tax.
Hospitals will end up getting $9 back for every $1 they pay if the state legislature passes the plan and it meets federal approval.
Buntin said if she had health insurance, home nurses could help her prevent the infections that keep sending her to emergency rooms. Like Crockett and Lannom, she didn't know who her state representatives are. She lives in the district represented by state Sen. Ferrell Haile, R-Gallatin, who never got an opportunity to vote on Insure Tennessee because the legislation never made it to the Senate floor.
No member of the House of Representatives has cast any kind of vote on Insure Tennessee because enabling legislation has yet to be placed on a House committee agenda.
Reach Tom Wilemon at 615-726-5961 and on Twitter @TomWilemon.
Who's your legislator?
The website for the Tennessee General Assembly allows voters to identify their legislators simply by typing in their addresses and hitting the search button. Visit www.capitol.tn.gov/legislators/.
Hospital executives seek help from the uninsured
Hospital executives are urging uninsured people to contact their state senators and representatives to push for Insure Tennessee, the proposal from Gov. Bill Haslam to expand health coverage to 280,000 Tennesseans.
"Right this minute I would tell them they really do need to talk to their representative and senator about Insure Tennessee because it's not a handout," said Dr. Mike Schatzlein, chief executive officer of Saint Thomas Health. "It's a program for them to not feel like second-class citizens when they go seek health care."
William F. Carpenter III, chief executive officer of LifePoint Hospitals, had this to say:
"People in Tennessee want to be able to get care close to home, and Insure Tennessee allows an opportunity for that to happen. I would tell them you have the ability to get coverage if Insure Tennessee passes, and you have the ability to take care of your family in a different way if Insure Tennessee passes. We'll tell the story. We need them to tell the story, too."
— Holly Fletcher, The Tennessean