Gimme Your Areoplan Points!

I feel like I have moved from one hurry-up and wait situation to another and keep repeating the pattern. Last week I finally got the word that Achmed is indeed benign, which incidentally made me feel about 40 pounds lighter around the shoulder area in an instant, and now I am still waiting for my schedule. Apparently I am going to Winnipeg in October for my nuclear blast. I guess the medical team figure that I have nothing else to do but sit around and wait and see when that will be... it is not like I have any plans to make, such as work meetings and events or possibly a social life!

On many occasions in the past I have referred to Canada’s health care system as a sick care program, and I actually started to feel a bit bad about my criticism of it after things seemed to be moving along so well for me once I actually had a problem (or opportunity) to deal with. Well, once I got my marching orders to get ready for my ‘vacation’ in Winterpeg, I had to look into a bunch of stuff related to insurance and costs related to the treatment. The treatment itself is covered, all $17,000 of it and to my understanding I don’t even have to front the money and get reimbursed. That is a huge break for me, as any of you who deal with government payables at all will know, it takes months to get your money back or just get paid from these finance departments.

My issue is that I do have to pay for all of the ‘non-treatment’ costs! Things like transportation, hotel, food, taxis, etc all come from me. Now, in fairness to the health department here, I do get 50% of it back, after a $400 deductable, once I submit my expense claim upon my return form Winnipeg. I did up a rough budget... my bill for this is going to be between $3000 and $3500, which is for me and my chief Lieutenant (Mom) to go to the middle of nowhere and stay on the flatlands for a week (I am not allowed to travel alone afterwards, so I need an escort). Eventually, and hopefully by the time the Olympics are over, I will get between $1300 and $1550 of that back. Aeroplan points for Air Canada will cut significantly into that dollar amount, so if anyone has a few thousand of them kicking around, drop me a line:)

This situation really does piss me off though. I am very fortunate that Mr. Visa enables me to afford this financial hit, but considering the amount of taxes that I pay in this country so that we can have a “Health Care” system, it disgusts me that I have to pay anything for this. Yes, they will pay for my treatment, but seriously, how do they expect me to get blasted (and not in a good way) if I don’t go there? This is not like optional, cosmetic surgery. Eventually this tumor will likely paralyse and kill me if I don’t do something about it. Besides, like anyone, I would much rather spend a couple of thousand dollars on a real vacation not a medical one. I suppose you have to look at the bright side, better to spend the money on a nuclear blast trip than on a funeral!

So, while I sit and wait for my travel schedule, I can’t help but think about how bad this could be if I was not in a position to look after things. A number of my close friends have offered me Areoplan points and I will accept them all. Whatever is left over I am going to be looking into setting up a trust for people like me who need to travel for specialized medical treatment. I have no idea how any of that kind of thing works, but I am sure that in the interest of good corporate citizenship, the people at Areoplan will be happy to help me set up a charitable fund where people can donate Air Miles to strangers for medical travel. If everyone in Canada donated 100 miles to this plan, the fund would start off with 300 million travel miles.

So, if you are reading this, think about how many miles you have been fortunate enough to collect, and consider how many of them that you would be willing to part with so that a stranger can benefit from your good fortune.

From Achmed and Me... Live Life!