My neighbor came by today, he lives down the street and we often ride our bikes around the neighborhood for exercise. He’s a Cuban exile, and he speaks almost no English. But he’s lived here for years, and he works, and pays his own way. He’s one of the few people I get to practice my Spanish on.

His wife (also a Latin with little English) is very sick, she has to go into the hospital for brain tumor surgery next week. They don’t qualify for Medicaid, and are too young for Medicare, but they have medical insurance under Obamacare. They were terrified because they received a letter from the ACA and they needed someone to translate it for them; he was terrified that it was bad news from the government about their health insurance. They know about the move to repeal and replace that is going about.

The letter was good news, it was simply a notification from the Government that their application had been received, and all their paperwork was in order. She will get her surgery on schedule, it will be covered by her insurance, and the copay will be $600. It also listed phone numbers they could call where translators were available to answer her questions.

As I translated the document, I could see the expression on the man’s face gradually change, from despair to relief, and then to joy. It broke my heart. I wondered if the result would have been any different if the surgery had been scheduled six months or so from now. Yeah, by then, we may very well have death panels.

He thanked me profusely, almost embarrassing me, as if I had anything to do with the contents of the message.