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Reaction Paper
November 4, 2011
Sociology 101
Reaction Paper #1 In selection “Sick out of Luck, The Uninsured in America” by Susan Starr Sered and Rushika Fernandopulle it discusses the many uninsured people in our society and the extreme measures they go to in order to receive health insurance and also the difficulties of not having health care. In this selection the author’s don’t really have an argument but in the beginning of the selection they talk about the interviews they have had with uninsured Americans and how these interviews demonstrate that working and taking jobs solely for health care is leading to fundamental changes in the nature of society. Basically they are saying that in today’s society having a job isn’t a stable way of having health insurance. The author’s also state how being uninsured is the new status in American society.
This selection gave the story of two people in this health care and job situation. The main one was a woman named Fran, who has worked for seven years as an inventory-control supervisor at a large manufacturing plant. She felt very accomplished and successful at this job then one day her plant got bought and she lost her job with all her benefits. When she lost her job she was 42 years old and she decide to just go to a community college for two years and go without medical coverage for those two years because she felt she was fairly healthy and that she would be fine. All of a sudden one day Fran thought she had a hangnail no her finger so she went to a physician who gave her instructions to follow and said if her finger didn’t heal then come back for surgery but she would have to bring 200 dollars because they can’t do a surgery without insurance so she never came back. Several months later she became very weak and went to the county health department for a pap smear and then they found out that Gangrene had set into her finger at site of the small hangnail, which resulted from her undiagnosed and untreated diabetes. Fran got



Bibliography: Ledue, Chelsea. "More than 20M Working Americans Lack Health Insurance." Healthcare Finance News. Med Tech, 23 Mar. 2010. Web. 04 Nov. 2011. <http://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/more-20m-working-americans-lack-health-insurance>. Galewitz, Phil, and Andrew Villegas. "Number of Uninsured Americans Hits Record High - Health - Health Care - Msnbc.com." Msnbc.com - Breaking News, Science and Tech News, World News, US News, Local News- Msnbc.com. MSN, 16 Sept. 2010. Web. 04 Nov. 2011. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39215770/ns/health-health_care/t/number-uninsured-americans-hits-record-high>.

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