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Opinion
Smoky Mountain News
Do your part, let’s beat this thing
What else can we say about Cawthorn? To the Editor: Apparently, though he took the sacred vows of marriage in front of a cross, meeting Donald Trump’s “needs” is more important to Madison Cawthorn than meeting his wife’s. What else does anyone need to know about the man? Mark H. Holden Franklin
Haywood County has dropped the ball To the Editor: We are in the middle of another wave of Covid and Haywood County has dropped the ball. Where are our free testing sites? Buncombe County has them. Jackson County has them. Why don’t we? We have neighbors who are sick and need a proper diagnosis. We have neighbors who have been off work for the holidays and need testing before they can return. We have neighbors who have been in close contact with Covid but don’t have symptoms — they could be contagious. Our stores are out of home testing kits and if they can be found cost approximately $25 for a two-test box. Urgent care tests are reportedly costing $85 to $125. Our neighbors are being told to get online and order free tests through LabCorps but those won’t arrive in the mail for days.
able mutation abilities of this particular virus. Like the old whack-a-mole game, we’d smack one variant down and another pops up in another part of the world. Researchers, drug companies and health care workers have done an amazing job, but weary as they may be there is work yet to do. Unfortunately, politics has played a role helping the pandemic linger, especially in the U.S. Some said Covid was no big deal, some said the vaccines did not work and were dangerous, others said mask wearing and vaccine mandates were assaults on their personal freedoms. The political divide on Covid issues started with President Donald Trump, but it has lingered and Editor festered long after he has left office. I’ve been skeptical of authority my entire life, someone who just naturally tends to bow up to rules. Not sure where it started, not sure how it has remained a part of who I am, but if someone tells me to go one way, I’m immediately looking in the other direction. But I also feel very strongly about doing my part for the common good. Tell me to wear a mask because some politician wants me to, I’ll laugh in your face; tell me to wear a mask because it will protect someone’s grandma or their sick father, I’m masking up, no problem. In fact, I can’t under-
Scott McLeod
Three tests, two shots, but just let me know if more is needed. That’s a short and very superficial synopsis of my personal Covid story, but in truth the story goes much deeper. I suspect that’s the truth for most of us. This past Sunday morning found me in a long line at a Tampa, Florida, testing site. I had what felt like a terrible head cold with congestion and coughing, and my voice was almost gone. I was hoping to visit with some nieces and nephews and their partners that afternoon, but I wanted to test first. The results were negative, as had happened with my previous two tests, though my wife had tested positive earlier in 2021 and we had not quarantined because we didn’t know in time. I have received the Johnson & Johnson vaccination and had gotten a booster in November soon after it became available for me. As of today, reports are that there were 1 million new cases reported on Monday, Jan. 3 (though many think the high number was due to a holiday backlog, but likely still we are having 500,000 new cases per day at least). The president plans to talk to the nation tonight (Tuesday) as the omicron variant is sending cases soaring and raising more questions about where all this is headed. Last January, many were writing that by January 2022 we would have the Covid-19 epidemic behind us. There are many reasons that did not happen, among them the wildly adapt-
LETTERS The costs are out of reach for many of our neighbors. For a lot of folks, driving to neighboring counties and waiting for tests to arrive aren’t acceptable options. Meanwhile, our Covid numbers are very likely underreported because of lack of testing or home testing without reporting. We need free Covid testing sites in
The line in Tampa, Florida, for Covid testing on Sunday, Jan. 2. Scott McLeod photo stand how anyone could feel differently. Here I am writing my first column of 2022 and we’re not out of the woods yet with Covid. Do your part, think about others, and let’s get this damn thing behind us. (Scott McLeod can be reached at info@smokymountainnews.com)
Haywood County. We have needed them all along but especially now. What is Haywood County Health and Human Services doing about this? How is the Haywood County Commission directing funding? Testing is one of the key pieces to getting this pandemic under control. Who can make this happen now? Ann Holtz Waynesville
Medicare changes bad for patients To the Editor: If you survived the daily bombardment of TV ads for Medicare Advantage plans during Medicare Open Enrollment and chose to stick with traditional Medicare, you could be in for a big surprise. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services “Innovation Center” is “piloting” a program in North Carolina and other states that will move traditional Medicare enrollees into third-party private, for profit middlemen — labeled “Direct Contracting Entities” — without your knowledge or consent, and without congressional oversight. Traditional enrollees are to be autoaligned in DCEs if their primary care physician becomes affiliated with a DCE. CMS automatically searches two years of a senior’s claim history to find any visits with a participating DCE provider and assigns the enrollee to that DCE. This is all done without your knowledge or consent. The payment model is similar to Medicare Advantage plans, which means it incentivizes DCEs to both “upcode” diagnoses to increase capitation payments and then to spend as little as possible on patient care. Upcoding is fraud in that the provider is getting paid a higher rate for a service that was not provided. It encourages rationing of care, because the DCE can keep as profit any of the capitation payment that is not spent on patient care. It is also about
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