As a Canadian, these threads that keep popping up are horrifying to me - I have trouble wrapping my head around how this can happen in a country as rich as the US. I’m contributing and wish her well; she’s given a lot of joy to our hobby and now needs our support. I know that artists and other independent creatives are particularly vulnerable to lacking health care in the US so I hope that if one other good thing can come of these gofundmes it’s that folks consider expanding healthcare coverage.
I hear you. I live in the US and it still shocks. I remember first hearing about it pre-GoFundMe that a popular author, whom had a rather significant collection on my own shelves, didn't have health insurance and was in dire straights because of lack of health insurance.
Historically, back in WW2 they were worried about heavy inflation as workers became scarce due to the amount of manpower in the war effort would lead to sky high wages, and the US passed the Stabilization Act to stop wages from growing a lot. Employers started offering Health Care to lure in and keep workers. Healthcare in the US has become very expensive for the consumer, way out of sync with the actual costs (though many of us Americans don't truly understand how low the cost of providing it really is*). So if you aren't a full time employee of a mid-sized or larger business, you likely don't have health insurance.
That changed a few President's ago, when the AMA was passed, that required everyone to have healthcare but also set up much more affordable markets for individuals. But it's still not good considering the sky high rates, often more of a disaster insurance.
EDIT: Each layer of healthcare also jacks up the price. Insurance also goes and works out "discounted" prices (which are much more than elsewhere in the world) but if you go to an out-of-network doctor they will only cover "usual and customary" prices and you are stuck with the rest. And if you don't have healthcare, you are stuck paying those undiscounted prices. END EDIT.
We have a lot of things that people with universal healthcare just haven't been exposed to. For instance, since there are a number of insurance providers, you can change who is your provider. Because you haven't been paying into your new provider your entire life, they need to protect the existing people in their pool against those who contributed to a different pool but bring over high expense items, so we have something called "pre-existing conditions". These can ramp your healthcare costs up quite high, and if you leave an employer and need to get private healthcare, can price it out of reach.
About 2/3 of all bankruptcies in the US are medical bankruptcies, where the cost of care put on the person is more than all they own and can pay off.
EDIT: Added image:
