Youssif’s Healthcare Should Be the Model for All

Youssif is the five year old Iraqi boy who was allegedly doused with gasoline and burned by unidentified masked men while he was just outside his home back in Baghdad back in January 2007. Featured in a CNN story Youssif’s plight became global news. His family was unable to come up with the funds for the surgeries to repair Youssif’s scarring. But, ever since his story was aired there has been an outpouring of support for Youssif. CNN and the California based Children’s Burn Foundation have established a fund that has raised three hundred thousand dollars to make Youssif whole again. The Children’s Burn Foundation has agreed to pay for transportation to fly Youssif and his family to the United States, pay for housing for the family while they are here, and pay for the medical cost to repair the damage to the boy’s skin. Dr. Peter Grossman of the Sherman Oaks Grossman Burn Center has volunteered to perform the surgery without charge. The family of four, Youssif, his baby sister, mother, and father, arrived in California on September 11th. I remember seeing the video of the family flying with first class accommodations. The first in a series of cosmetic surgeries was performed September 20th.

As part of the Thanksgiving Day propaganda CNN wanted to show Youssif and his family giving thanks for all the good fortune that they have received thanks mostly to CNN. The latest video clips show Youssif playing with other children at a camp specifically designated for children suffering from and healing from their burn wounds. The pictures of Youssif show the young man’s face distorted from small inflatable sacks imbedded underneath the skin’s surface. According to the story, Youssif’s healthy skin that was not damaged from the attack will be stretched and forced to grow in excess so that it can be used to replace the damaged skin. Youssif appears to be receiving the best cutting edge cosmetic medicine science has to offer.

There are hundreds of thousands of children suffering from injuries in Iraq. Why did CNN take such an interest in the story of Youssif? What made him the lucky one? There are so many children here in the United States that are in need of healthcare services, why did CNN have to go to Iraq to find a child in need of medical care? Obviously, a lot of people feel that the up close and personal attention that Youssif is getting is incentive enough to help his cause. But what about all of the other children who are going without help because nobody knows about their cause? Does each child’s story have to be publicly exposed in order for people to care?

If the public’s response to Youssif is any indication it seems that a lot of people enjoy helping children in need. A lot of people have an understanding of the positive energy that can be generated from doing something positive to help someone who is unable to help themselves in our midst. Helping each other out is what community is all about. But the problem is our community is designed to help someone and not designed to help everyone. Helping only one child in our midst is enough for many people. But trying to set up a program that helps as many children as possible is something that many of us are vehemently opposed to.

The healthcare program known as the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) is designed to help low income families that make too much money to qualify for Medicaid but cannot afford private health insurance. A recent study by the Vimo Research Group found that nearly seventy percent of newly uninsured children were from families that earned as much as twice the federal poverty level. Since its inception in 1997 SCHIP has cost the federal government about forty billion dollars. Sounds like a lot of money, but the program is facing financial shortages. A recent proposal by Congress was to expand the funding for this program to nearly twelve billion dollars per year to increase the number of children eligible to be covered. But the idea of expanding the number of children eligible for coverage of a program already in motion reeks too much of social medicine and would be the first step towards federalizing healthcare. Somebody’s got to protect the insurance industry’s profits.

And lord knows once healthcare becomes federalized this country is just a step or two away from some version of universal healthcare. And lord knows that can’t be good for the people. Rudy Giuliani recently made an attack against the presidential candidates from the Democratic Party in a campaign speech warning his audience that if elected the Democrats will try to enact some kind of universal healthcare and he would never force such a program on the public. His audience went wild with support. Somebody’s got to protect the insurance industry’s future profits.

Universal healthcare would protect the health of all children. We wouldn’t have to wait for some media outlet to tell the public here is a kid that is suffering before we would pool our resources to help. But the idea of having a program that automatically covers all the children is too much for people’s common sense. Spending twelve billion a year to protect children’s health is just too expensive. This is the thinking from a people that can stomach spending more than one hundred ninety billion dollars next year on the Iraqi war. But chances are good we could save more children by spending twelve billion dollars annually on their health rather than annually spending more than fifteen times that sum plus a few thousand soldier’s lives in the war in Iraq.

Until we as a community learn to put our priorities in order we can console ourselves by knowing that we at least took care of one child. Youssif will get the best medical care available. Focus on him and you’ll feel good about doing something for someone who couldn’t help himself. Just don’t pay any attention to all the millions of other children that need help. They’ll just bring you down.

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