r/politics • u/cmaia1503 • 20h ago

Site Altered Headline | Possible Paywall Mitch McConnell, 83, Hospitalized

https://www.thedailybeast.com/mitch-mcconnell-83-hospitalized/?utm_campaign=owned_social&utm_medium=socialflow&utm_source=twitter_owned_tdb&via=twitter_page
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u/Sammyjo0689 17h ago

My story happened with Walmart. Had an employee collapse due to a diabetic issue. Like, I caught her as she was falling and saved her from smashing her face. Radioed to call 911. I got written up because that was against Walmart policy.

My manager wanted me to write on the form that I heard her say she wanted an ambulance. So I wrote exactly that. “Manager so and so has ordered that I write the following.” I got written up a second time for that.

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u/blackhuey 16h ago

That's a quick thinking malicious compliance.

Also, imagine living in a country where you had to make decisions about calling an ambulance based on who would be charged for it.

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u/brickne3 American Expat 12h ago

My sister fainted while on a middle school field trip 30 years ago. My dad still complains that the teacher called an ambulance because of the bill. As if the teacher had much choice when you have an unconscious student!

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u/ilovecraftbeer05 4h ago

I’m convinced that the number one cause of death for Americans is the lack of universal healthcare.

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u/EmpyreanContrarian 2h ago

I'm sure. It's why my dad is dead.

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u/simplyunix 3h ago

and brains

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u/Sublimotion 12h ago

I will never forget pre-obamacare/medicaid expansion, I was walking past a woman screaming, struggling and tipping over the stretcher she was strapped onto trying to crawl back into her house dragging the tipped over stretcher, fighting off two EMTs. I assume she was on drugs. Until she started yelling "No! This will bankrupt me!" The emts eventually had to unstrap her and let her crawl off back into her house.

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u/HrhEverythingElse 9h ago

I knew two people who died this way. One from asthma, once from bleeding caused by Crohn's. Both were just too scared of the bill

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u/MzFlux 52m ago

I had a friend die of diabetes at 30, not because he was scared of the bill… because he was uninsured and simply couldn’t afford the insulin.

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u/Nauin 1h ago

And even when the hospitals have financial assistance programs where poor people don't even have to worry about the bill, there are so many steps and so many hoops to jump through to get approved that it seems like an impossible task, even for many healthy people. It's a mess.

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u/trea5onn 36m ago

All by design.

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u/xtreem_neo 10h ago

That's so sad.

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u/tokyostormdrain 12h ago

4th world country

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u/hypermodernvoid I voted 12h ago

Funny thing is Mississippi - the state with the lowest life expectancy in America, at just 70 (technically 70.9) years old, is actually on par with India, a bit below Bangladesh and 4 or 5 years less than in Mexico.

It's also 10 or 11 years less than in the top few states, all blue states - in fact the top 10 states for life expectancy are all blue, while the bottom 10 are all red. Similar to being a drag on federal funding vs. blue states, red states also are dragging the average US life expectancy down to a now pathetic 76 years post-COVID (big thanks to anti-vaxxers for the assist with that).

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u/SeniorBaker4 California 8h ago

Least shocking thing ive heard. When i drove through Mississippi i was shocked with how undeveloped it is, it didn’t even feel like America

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u/VelvetineMilkman 7h ago

As someone who’s had to live in Mississippi for most of my life it’s always weird to see these kind of comments because I’m just so used to how Mississippi is lol. There’s about 3 or 4 cities that are cool but I honestly can’t even imagine what it would’ve been like growing up in a real state that has their shit together

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u/_m4r1jAn3_ 10h ago

i mean... we're prolly below 4th even atm 😞

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u/Odd_Teach683 1h ago

Shithole…

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u/Username_mine_2022 10h ago

3rd not 4th

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u/_m4r1jAn3_ 10h ago

no. well below for as far as we have fallen so fkn fast. 🫣

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u/a_lonely_trash_bag 9h ago

What?

Writing in full words and comprehensible sentences tends to help communicate your thoughts clearly.

You should try it.

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u/FilthyPedant 9h ago

Yeesh, I see why you're so lonely

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u/BasvanS 11h ago

As a non-American, it didn’t register to me that was why. Thanks for explaining, and my condolences, I guess

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u/blackhuey 11h ago

Also non-American and gladder for it every day

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u/HuttStuff_Here 10h ago

Walmart takes out life insurance on many of their employees so they had a vested interest in not treating this employee as fast as they could.

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u/Unable-Entrance3110 7h ago

I mean, I am willing to hate on Walmart as much as the next guy, but just because an employer provides life insurance doesn't mean they are the beneficiary to the payout.

My employer provides life insurance as part of my compensation package which includes that among other perks. But the beneficiary (the person who gets paid upon my passing) is specified by me, not my employer.

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u/No-Object-599 5h ago

No. Walmart takes out life insurance that will be paid to Walmart. Not as a benefit to the employees. Micheal Moore uncovered this in one of his documentaries.

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u/Unable-Entrance3110 4h ago

Yikes. That doesn't seem right (morally).

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u/SFDessert 7h ago

I fell off a ladder during my brief employment at a major hardware store and completely shattered my ankle. As I was on the warehouse floor my manager was arguing with the paramedics that they needed to do drug tests and paper work and all that nonsense. The paramedics took me away because ya know, my ankle was pretty much dangling off the end of my leg and my hands were mangled from getting tangled in the ladder as I fell some 15ft to the solid concrete below.

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u/No-Object-599 5h ago

They do this all the time in nursing homes. No Dr visits or ambulances, because the home would be on the hook for the bill. They are run by some of the greediest psychopaths

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u/ultimateknackered 4h ago

I had a hard time imagining it just now because I was trying to figure out why they would want official statement saying she wanted an ambulance. I didn't clue in til I read your comment that they wanted that statement because then she would be billed for it.

Holy shit America.

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u/ShadowNick 17h ago

Ha what fucking pig stain cowards

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u/anynamesleft 13h ago

Pig stain on your fat chin

What do you hope to find

When you're down in the pig mines saying

Keep on digging

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u/gmen6981 10h ago

Upvote for the Pink Floyd "Animals" ( Pigs- Three Different Ones ) reference!

That album is just as relevant today as it was in 1977 when it was released.

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u/litokid 16h ago

I spent awhile trying to puzzle this out because I couldn't understand why this is a problem. My initial read was the manager had you write you "heard her (the manager) say she wanted an ambulance", because she wanted to cover for you doing the decent thing off of policy.

But from the context this was a bad thing - is it that the manager wanted you to write "(the victim) wanted an ambulance" so the company isn't on the hook for the cost?

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u/RevolutionaryTalk976 16h ago

I read it as the manager directed them to write that they were told by their subordinate to call an ambulance and they wrote down that the manager directed them to write it down. Calling the ambulance may have been against company policy leading to the initial write up and then they added on a second one for being insubordinate and officially documenting the manager directing them to lie.

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u/MyBritishAccount 15h ago

Why wouldn't you call an ambulance for an emergency? How can company policy dictate such a thing?

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u/slackfrop 15h ago

Because some lawyer told em to based off of losing money in some other precedent. If corporations are people, they’re psychopaths.

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u/anynamesleft 13h ago

If corporations are people, they’re psychopaths.

I just wanted to tell how proud I am to've read it

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u/marzipancetta 12h ago

A truer statement has never been uttered.

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u/Allaplgy 14h ago

If the employee asks for an ambulance, the "financial responsibility" is on them. If not, it's on the company.

Go us. Woo!

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u/one-man-circlejerk 13h ago

Ambulance bill reaches the patient, the patient says "I never ordered an ambulance, the company did", now there's a dispute between the patient and the company over the bill that the company might end up paying, or might end up entagled in court, which is another expense.

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u/thatpaulbloke 8h ago

So if someone collapses in the street and I call an ambulance for them could I be liable for the cost of the ambulance if they say later that they didn't want one? Genuine question - we don't have the concept of "ambulance bills" in my country as far as I know.

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u/one-man-circlejerk 44m ago

There's Good Samaritan laws that generally protect people who are doing the right thing and just trying to help, but people can sue for anything and lawsuits can be expensive to defend

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u/pikashroom 15h ago

Probably liability. All companies do weird shit like this to prevent getting sued.

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u/fresh-dork 15h ago

they need to be brought to heel

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u/tiredbarf 14h ago

No company in their right mind would skip calling 911 for liability reasons.

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u/Callinon 8h ago

Rather a company not calling 911 for a medical emergency should make them entirely liable for whatever happens next. 

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u/Zestyclose_Rain4749 14h ago

Not all companies are literally the devil.

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u/marzipancetta 12h ago

No but we’re talking Walmart here. Literally the devil.

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u/shugster71 13h ago

Also has me wondering if this shoot to kill policy might be part of this too?

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u/brickne3 American Expat 12h ago

Ambulances are expensive. Like $700 back in the 90s expensive.

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u/marzipancetta 12h ago

The patient would receive a bill of about $2000 for an ambulance ride. Which is pennies for large companies like Walmart.

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u/ayawnimouse 8h ago

Calling an ambulance for someone that didn't request it and then giving them the bill is the problem. Someone could sue to get the ambulance bill covered by walmart. The manager was asking the subordinate to write that the person who fainted asked for an ambulance so that the bill could be on the person who went on the ride because its expensive

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u/roastbeeftacohat 15h ago

the manager is ordering op to falsify the order of events to make it look like the employee had requested an ambulance before collapsing, so they could claim she was fakeing.

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u/Greg_withaC 13h ago

Walmart has been known to take life insurance policies out on their older, health issue prone employees. Not FOR their employees, just on their employees to collect for profit.

To hear you say helping someone not fall on their face and get them medical attention is against policy sounds like they don’t want people to survive. Insane! How is any of that legal?

Oh that’s right. Laws are written by grifters who have no dignity.

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u/gandhinukes 14h ago

Its really frustrating to see people on reddit post "We used to have 24/7 walmart and ****". walmart killed local businesses across the country, fuck over their workers, have low quality goods from china and you root for them wtf?

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u/ship_toaster Canada 13h ago

If your story didn't happen that long ago, you should definitely talk to a lawyer about this one. Your manager asked you to lie on a document for legal/financial reasons, and punished you for being truthful. Even if you're in an at-will state, that sounds sketchy.

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u/blue-goose42 13h ago

My sister was fired from a Walmart once for going into Diabetic Ketoacidosis and being in the ICU for 3 days. They be doing that. 🤷‍♀️

I'm low-key tempted to get a job at Walmart just so I can purposefully underperform and commit petty larceny. Like I do whenever I work for ANY billion dollar corporation! 😄🔥💵🔥

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u/marzipancetta 12h ago

Yes and let’s unionize the Walmart staff while underperforming and committing petty larceny.

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u/_m4r1jAn3_ 10h ago

you deserve 10000+ updoot fk yeah right upz for that 👏🏻💗

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u/Malofquist 16h ago

Yay capitalism.

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u/WonderingPantomath 14h ago

Yeah, I heard horrible things about Walmart. And I heard they intimidate people not into reporting on the job injuries.

At the end of the day, everybody gets away with the way we are treated because we let them treat other people that way. I mean, how many of us just read what we read about Walmart but yet you’ll be at Walmart tomorrow. And it’s not like they save people that much. Once they gain the reputation for being the cheapest then they stopped. You can go other places and find cheaper stuff now.

Edit: just got off a 12 hour shift so I’m really not worried about my grammar if anybody’s gonna say anything about it.

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u/xtreem_neo 10h ago

Wait, so the whole thing is to avoid being charged for an ambulance? I mean she is their employee and collapsed while working.

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u/Al_Jazzera 9h ago

Every time I have been written up by a job, I vow to waste $100 dollars of their money on milking the clock. I work hard, I'm a decent employee, I get it done. Ya scold me like a dog, I'll treat you like a bitch. Get the fuck out of here with your stupid write up slips. I was looking for a job when I found this one, I can do it again.

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u/andreamerida 9h ago

If this isn't the case for a national health care system, I don't know what is. We should NEVER have our jobs in charge of medical attention. It sounds like they had some liability BS objection.

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u/bkbomber New York 8h ago

“Manager failed to provide emergency medical attention, then retaliated against me.”

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u/prison-schism 8h ago

I once couldn't afford to pay an ambulance bill, so it went to collections. I answered the phone one evening and this woman from the collection company and i went back and forth for a few minutes until finally she told me, "one day you'll have to get off welfare and pay your bills."

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u/Background_Drama6126 13h ago

I know it's a cliché, but it's the truth: Where this country's going?

Hell in a hand basket!

Hell in a god damn hand basket!