Medicaid: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

I'm 31 years old and am on Social Security and Medicaid. I work and I feel trapped as I'm not allowed to earn above a set amount per year or lose both SSI and Medicaid completely. Yet, there are so many strings attached to the point that it's a poverty trap I never wanted to be in. I want everyone to have universal healthcare.

The fact that our society tries to justify which people are and aren’t deserving of basic health care tells me EXACTLY how much it values life.

My mother has to re-enroll my younger disabled brother EVERY year for Medicaid. And they are constantly finding new ways to try to knock him off Medicaid, including stating that he needed to be working in order to qualify. Mentally disabled, unable to speak, and barely able to walk, he is completely dependent on my mother for all his care, including bathing. Medicaid refused to believe that he was disabled, regardless of the doctor's note, so one year, my mom took him to the SS office, where he proceeded to yell, knock over chairs, and cause a ruckus. It took them 10 seconds to realize he was unable to work and approved his Medicaid. Until the following year when she had to re-enroll him again. Sigh.....

I live in NC and I’m in college. I finally have Medicaid after NC passed an expansion. I have to have two surgeries this year and I’m so thankful they’ll be covered. My doctor said one of them could technically be pushed back a few years but I said no, I want to do it while I know for sure that I have Medicaid coverage. You never know what could happen after elections

Everyone with Medicaid that I know is working. Their pay is just shit. People talk trash about those on medicaid like they are "taking advantage" of someone they are not. I barely make 15.00 an hour. Lost medicaid. I have fibermyalgia, rehumatoid arthritis, chronic asthma. Getting up and going to work everyday is something I do and some days it is very, very hard. Thank you John Oliver for bringing attention to this situation.

When Fallon and Colbert are off the air, Oliver will still be here. This format just works. He’s easily got another decade and change.

In Florida I have a patient (I am a primary care doc) who could not afford to come to a doctor - but finally went to the ER with his severe abdominal pain. They ran blood work and did a CT scan. They told him that he had metastatic pancreatic cancer that has spread to his liver. He left the ER with that diagnosis. He has no money. He has no insurance. He lives in his car. I cannot even imagine how someone could deal with this even if they had money, a home, support, and access to good care with good insurance. Welcome to Florida, where I routinely advise patients to move back to the states or countries they came here from - where they had health care.

John Oliver educates or at least opens the door for folks to do more research. He’s hilarious and is keeping me out of my psychiatrist’s office during these nuts times in the US

I'm a single mother of 5. I worked my ass off to get my family out of poverty and into a home of our own. Then I got a $1 an hour raise at work. My $1 extra an hour added $160 a month to my total income, but I lost both Medicaid and food stamps. Even with going to food banks every chance I could to try to help, losing my $800 a month in food stamps really hurt us. My $160 extra a month at work wasn't going to feed us all. Losing Medicaid meant I needed to add a health insurance plan at work (and for my size family, it was about $800 a month)...... so I ended up back in poverty again. It's ridiculous. Getting that raise literally cost me everything.

I literally lost my Medicaid last week and wondered why. I have 3 girls, work full time taking care of my 84yr grandma, and live with Bipolar 2 and psoriatic arthritis. I’m devastated and have no idea what to do. I have an appointment at the welfare office this week so wish me luck 😞

Im on medicaid. I recently was reapproved for a biologic and notified via letter. When I called the special ty pharmacy they said I had a small copay "$35,000.00". That took a while to figure out. The big problem with medicaid is the fact that as long as you need expensive care you will have to remain far below the poverty line.

Thank you for making me so thankful to be Canadian, that is a much rarer sensation than it used to be, so it is nice to be reminded that we do at least one thing right.

That thing of "We'll give you healthcare if you're deserving" sounds a lot like eugenics.

My daughter has a medical condition and we signed her up for benefits when she was around 5 or 6. They told us there was a waiting list and put us on it. We got a letter a few weeks ago asking if we still wanted to be on the waiting list. She's 23.

I can't tell you how disappointed I was that the closing PSA didn't end with a cutaway to Stanley Tucci gently reassuring me that I could calm my rage with a nice, refreshing negroni.

My mom has Medicaid in California. We went through a Elder Care attorney to have them fill out the paperwork and get it set up. I was told this year that from now on they're just going to add the cola to it and if my mom's income is still below the limit the state will automatically renew it - no paperwork! Medicaid has been a lifesaver for my mom.

That "doctor" going "Yup, sometimes we let people sit in their own shit for a few days, ain't no big deal" was really something. How is he a real person?

People don't actually WANT to be sick or injured. "Inelastic demand" is a concept that economists ought to apply to the medical field.

I realized decades ago that I needed to either squeeze myself much higher up on the socioeconomic ladder to a level unrealistic for me to attain, or impoverish myself far enough below the poverty line that I can reasonably avoid panic attacks every year when I recertify for Medicaid.

I live in Idaho and when I was pregnant I was told I made $10 too much to qualify for Medicaid. My insurance also dropped me for missing one payment so I had to go through my pregnancy without any insurance until I was shipped to Oregon for complications with my kiddo. In Oregon I qualified for Medicaid.