Exploring chronic illness in the work place
Here's a quick snippet from an older article from More magazine titled "Ill in a Day's Work". I came across it over a year ago, after a DL excerpt was featured on More.com. I thought I'd better see what this magazine was all about - and I ended up finding this thought-provoking article, along with a slew of other great stuff. Check it out when you have the chance, but read on for a quick glance at what the article has to offer:
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"Ill in a Day's Work"
by Donna Jackson Nakazawa
A great deal of stigma is attached to chronic illness in the workplace," says Stephanie Woolhandler, MD, co director of the internal medicine fellowship program at Harvard Medical School. "The system isn't very fair to anyone who is sick. But it is particularly unfair to women, who are more likely to suffer from chronic illness during the prime working years." Women who are sick find themselves in a triple bind: unable to excel at their career because they are sick; unable to take good care of their health because they are working; unable to quit because they need the health insurance they can get only through a job. "If you have to quit working altogether, the options for health insurance are pretty dismal," Woolhandler says. "You'll be eligible for COBRA, but you'll have to pay full premium out of your own pocket. Many people on COBRA incur huge debt and end up in bankruptcy. When COBRA runs out, you may qualify for Medicare. Or you may spend until you reach poverty level and get Medicaid. But if you have cancer, you cannot buy private insurance after COBRA runs out. No one will sell it to you.
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Click here to read the entire article.
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"Ill in a Day's Work"
by Donna Jackson Nakazawa
A great deal of stigma is attached to chronic illness in the workplace," says Stephanie Woolhandler, MD, co director of the internal medicine fellowship program at Harvard Medical School. "The system isn't very fair to anyone who is sick. But it is particularly unfair to women, who are more likely to suffer from chronic illness during the prime working years." Women who are sick find themselves in a triple bind: unable to excel at their career because they are sick; unable to take good care of their health because they are working; unable to quit because they need the health insurance they can get only through a job. "If you have to quit working altogether, the options for health insurance are pretty dismal," Woolhandler says. "You'll be eligible for COBRA, but you'll have to pay full premium out of your own pocket. Many people on COBRA incur huge debt and end up in bankruptcy. When COBRA runs out, you may qualify for Medicare. Or you may spend until you reach poverty level and get Medicaid. But if you have cancer, you cannot buy private insurance after COBRA runs out. No one will sell it to you.
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Click here to read the entire article.
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