From the Democratic Underground, a post by Andrea Clark’s sister.

Imagine that you are sick and so you make sure that you are covered by really good health insurance [ed- BCBS - Blue Cross Blue Shield]. Your everyday life is a regimen of taking your medications, taking care of your young son, and keeping your appointements with your doctor. You’re not real sophisticated about health insurance, but you know that your health has never been good, because of your heart, so you spend what little extra you’ve got on supplemental insurance policies, because you really need to be sure that, if you get sicker, you’ve got the coverage to

take care of yourself. After all, you’re alone in the world, just you and your young son.

So…you do get sick. You have to go into the hospital. The news is not good: Your heart has some damaged valves which have to be repaired and replaced and you have almost no chance of surviving the surgery. But, if you don’t undergo the surgery, you have no chance at all of surviving. And, you’ve got insurance. You’ve got good doctors.

What would you do? You would probably go with the best odds, even though those odds are not good at all. You’d have the surgery. You’ve got the insurance and you’ve got the doctors. You, quite literally, have to put your life in their hands. You trust them.

So…you undergo the surgery. And, miraculously, you survive. Your insurance is still in force. You’ve got good doctors. Everything is rosy.

Then, you get an infection. Because of the infection, you develop complications. You have to go on some medications that cause other problems. You get a bedsore. You get more complications. In the meantime, the insurance costs are rising. The doctors are becoming less optimistic about your chances.

You’re fighting for your life. But the insurance company is still paying and getting mean about it. They start pressuring the hospital, which starts pressuring the doctor. The doctor had a patient who he could pull from the arms of death with surgery and he almost did it, but then these complications occurred. Things are not looking that rosy anymore. Pressure is mounting from the insurance company.

The doctor, caving to pressure from the hospital, which caved in to pressure from the insurance company, finally gets with the family to ask them for permission to pull the plug. But the family talked to you and you didn’t want to give up the fight.

The doctor convenes a meeting with other doctors and they decide to medicate you into unconsciousness so that you can’t say what you want anymore. Once they do that, they have another meeting, with other doctors and make the decision that they can unplug you, with or without your or your family’s permission.

These people, the insurance company that you gave your money to, in the expectation that they would pay for your medical bills; the doctor, who you trusted in and believed in, to have your best interests at heart–these are the people who are bringing about your death, just when you are fighting for your life the hardest you’ve ever had to fight.

Isn’t that one heck of a deal, guys? These are the people whose hands you put your life into and they are going to kill you. That’s the Texas Futile Care Law. And my sister is going to die because of it.

This is NOT another Terri Schaivo. There was a lot of dispute there between the family and the facts were in dispute – whether or not she was conscious and aware. This is NOT the case for Ms. Clark. Andrea Clarke is awake, aware, able to communicate. No one, including the doctors who have decided she must die, dispute that fact. As a nation, we need to have one collective ROAR over this outrage, that a person may be put to death in these circumstances. Bill Frist, Republicans, where are you?! This is THE pro-life case of the decade, the one where it is blindingly obvious, where the facts are undisputed, where the right to life (not to mention liberty and the pursuit of happiness) of an innocent person may legally be ended unless we take action to stop it.

The hospital (St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital) and Blue Cross Blue Shield are losing money on this case, and I sympathize. Sometimes I lose money on a project as well, as do all businesses. They need to find some other way to deal with that besides murdering the patient. They intend to pull the plug on Sunday, April 30th. This is murder. This is euthanasia. This is the dreaded slippery slope that started with abortion, which led to old people, and unconscious people, and now people who are awake and protesting.

The fact that this is occurring in a hospital named “St. Luke’s” is sickening. The insurance company who, according to Ms. Clark’s sister, is pressuring the hospital to do this, is Blue Cross Blue Shield. Apparently the “Ethics Committee” made the official decision to take Ms. Clark off the ventilator and dialysis.

If you have a blog, please blog about this, making mention of Blue Cross Blue Shield. If you have stock in BCBS, please consider selling it. If you have any connections to BCBS employees, encourage them to pass the word along that this is reprehensible and that killing expensive patients is not exactly a good selling point for their product. If you live in Texas, call your legislators. If you don’t live in Texas, find out if your state has a law like the “Futile Care Law” which permits conscious, awake, aware, protesting people to be executed because they are too expensive to continue to treat.

Most of all, PRAY.

Other blogs covering this:
Texas Rainmaker
My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
Hyscience
JackLewis.Net
Right Wing News
Slobokan’s Site Schtuff
BlogsforTerri
Pro-Life Blogs
Texas Advanced Directives Blog (Ms Clark’s attorney)
The Rogue Angel
Independent Christian Voice

Please, be polite, but call or email:

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas
901 S. Central Expressway
Richardson, Texas 75080
General Information: (972) 766-6900
TDD: (800) 735-2989 (for the hearing-impaired)
Houston office: 713-354-7000 or 800-235-0796

St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital
6720 Bertner Avenue
Houston, TX
Phone: 832-355-1000
Email: generalinformation@sleh.com

City of Houston
Mayor Bill White
P.O. Box 1562
Houston, TX 77251
Phone: 713-247-2200
Fax: 713-247-1067

Citizens Assistance Office
Richard Cantu, Director
900 Bagby, Public Level
Houston, TX 77002
Phone: 713-247-2907