Mary Lou Retton made an appearance on a Wheaties box following her achievement as the first American woman to win the gold medal in gymnastics all-around at the Summer Olympics in 1984. That was worth something once.
But Retton, America’s Reagan-era sweetheart, is critically ill in a hospital over forty years later. “My incredible mother, Mary Lou, is battling a severe case of pneumonia and is in critical condition,” her daughter said on the crowdsourcing platform Spotfund. “I won’t share every detail because I respect her and her privacy. I will say, though, that she is not covered.
Retton’s family has contributed more than $200,000 as of Wednesday morning to pay for her medical expenses. It is a breathtaking illustration of both the American people’s generosity and how adored Retton is. The scandal is that she, along with almost 30 million other Americans without insurance and 43 percent of those with inadequate insurance, must rely on online begs for survival.
Thus, Retton’s situation goes beyond that of a well-known sportsman. It is a sign of systemic dysfunction in the US healthcare system. This year, KFF—a reputable source for health policy research—found that over half of Americans struggle to pay for healthcare; that percentage increases when one considers the uninsured (like Retton) or ethnic minorities (like the people I work with on the Task Force).
According to the Commonwealth Fund, we have the most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet when it comes to health outcomes, we come in last among our peer countries. According to a different report by the Commonwealth Fund, “the US has the lowest life expectancy at birth, the highest death rates for preventable or treatable conditions, the highest maternal and infant mortality, and among the highest suicide rates.”
Anyone who has had to deal with this cruel and broken healthcare system would not be surprised by this; after all, it is, after all, just a business, with a primary focus on profit rather than the treatment of people. The majority of Americans—including myself and perhaps you as well—are susceptible to the exploitation that this unwieldy, profit-driven system contains. Even people who we consider to be wealthy may only be one or two pay checks away from financial disaster, particularly when faced with six-figure medical debt.