The Great American Eye-Exam Scam
Atlantic,
by
Yascha Mounk
Original Article
Posted By: Pluperfect,
11/29/2019 4:47:35 AM
On a beautiful summer day a few months ago, I walked down to the part of the Connecticut River that separates Vermont from New Hampshire, and rented a kayak. I pushed myself off the dock—and the next thing I remember is being underwater. Somehow, the kayak had capsized as it entered the river. I tried to swim up, toward the light, but found that my own boat blocked my way to safety. Doing my best not to panic, I swam down and away before finally coming up for air a few yards downriver. I clambered onto the dock, relieved to have found safety, but I was disturbed
Reply 1 - Posted by:
Toledo 11/29/2019 5:22:07 AM (No. 248198)
Baloney. Author must be libertarian. Eye exams cheap. $40 bucks at Costco. Plenty of eyeglass online companies offering glasses dirt cheap. If you need eyeglasses, get them.or move to another country like this guy suggests.
4 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
Catherine 11/29/2019 5:38:15 AM (No. 248204)
I disagree with this writer. We're talking about your eyes, here. What is more important than eyesight? Wonder what the results of just giving people glasses or contacts who have no had an exam? I'd like to see statistics on this. The alternative for many could end up being blindness. I'll do the yearly exam.
9 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
jeffkinnh 11/29/2019 5:58:50 AM (No. 248209)
There is an aspect totally ignored by the author. While there may be extra cost for exams by a doctor it is distributed across many patients who benefit from such screening. If the revenue from these exams is lost, it will be replaced with much higher costs for the exams that DO take place.
I do think that automated testing is becoming sufficient for first stage screening without annual exams by a doctor. I see my dental hygienist for a cleaning but the DENTIST only does an exam once in a while. That may be an acceptable model.
3 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
MainelySane 11/29/2019 7:51:21 AM (No. 248260)
If he was going kayaking and needs corrective eyewear, he should have been prepared for the "catastrophe". He's an educated person, it appears, but he has no commonsense which, by the way, seems prevalent with so many who really think they're smart (just ask them).
How could he be so stupid as to have NO extra contact lenses with him when on an "adventure"?
7 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
Jesuslover54 11/29/2019 7:56:00 AM (No. 248267)
One more "socialism is good" screed entered by another door.
3 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
MainelySane 11/29/2019 8:08:40 AM (No. 248276)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yascha_Mounk He's a leftist, globalist with a Ph.D. from Harvard. He may be correct about the need for easier access to his eye glass or contact lens prescription, but his whole column is an admission that he's stupid, no commonsense, as I commented previously.
11 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
LadyVet 11/29/2019 8:10:15 AM (No. 248278)
I do not think the author is arguing for medical socialism. I think he is arguing in favor of individuals being allowed to exercise their own judgment about whether his vision needs had changed and not have to get a renewed prescription to buy replacement glasses.
I always support more freedom for individual and less government interference. Yes, I know my vision is important and I will decide to go for an eye exam when I need it.
10 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Rumblehog 11/29/2019 8:48:09 AM (No. 248325)
#2 asks, "What is more important than eyesight?"
Response: A person's soul, and it's destination after death.
11 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
clayusmcret 11/29/2019 9:11:35 AM (No. 248356)
When I get a new prescription, I also get a copy of the prescription. Granted, it'll only be accepted for a year or so, but at least I have a copy if I'm away from home and my glasses get damaged or destroyed. At that point, I can get a replacement pair easily.
5 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
earlybird 11/29/2019 9:25:10 AM (No. 248373)
This is rubbish. A real kayak person would have had on goggles with a tether to keep them on his head. He was an overeducated amateur who didn’t think about what could happen. Kayaks do capsize, especially with greenhorns like Mounk aboard. But that anecdote was simply a device to get into his real beef, which is rather rotten. One can get prescriptions and glasses almost anywhere in America. And fairly inexpensive glasses. We want more than that. We want the opthalmologist who checks our eyes for other conditions and makes sure they don’t get beyond the point where they can be treated. The one who is able to look inside our eyes where we cannot.
Yasha is welcome to his third world contacts. I wouldn’t put them into my eyes any more than I would take medications from those places.
This kind of fake quasi-medical reporting is damaging. He should be ashamed.
9 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
earlybird 11/29/2019 9:31:35 AM (No. 248379)
PS. The person who wants to “exercise his own option” can go to Walmart or any drugstore and buy glasses. They just won’t fix anything that is more serious than needing magnification. At places like Lenscrafters and Linden Optometry, you can walk in off the street.
This guy obviously needs “walking around” eye correction or he wouldn’t be wearing contacts. And “flowery” (?) prescription sunglasses. Apparently no one ever told him that his “strength”, as he refers to it, is subject to change.
He has a lot more to learn. Maybe the hard way.
4 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
ROLFNader 11/29/2019 10:01:12 AM (No. 248416)
Don't ever take scientific/medical advice from someone who can't operate a kayak in still water.
4 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
msjena 11/29/2019 10:42:19 AM (No. 248468)
Why didn’t he have the optician read his prescription off of his prescription sunglasses? And LensCrafters makes glasses the same day.
1 person likes this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
Aud 11/29/2019 11:25:50 AM (No. 248505)
I like that the article author used the term “begs the question” correctly. Also liked his mention of “hard sell” techniques by eye clinics. I always feel guilty asking for my prescription after an eye exam and walking past the clinic’s frame shop as I leave for Walmart to get my $10 frames.
1 person likes this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
Chuzzles 11/29/2019 12:40:39 PM (No. 248571)
Eye exams are not only very reasonable, eyeglass companies are pushing freaky cheap deals online. Very stylish and all you need is to have your prescription handy. When I saw the publication, I knew the scam was that this publication could write an honest article.
1 person likes this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
kono 11/29/2019 2:53:50 PM (No. 248649)
Costco may have charged 40 bucks for the exam at some time or place; but mine was $100 there the last time I got one (5 years ago).
That said, some of the restrictions seem fairly reasonable; but some are simply not rational. To illustrate the latter: When my glasses fell from my breast pocket onto the pavement 15 years ago, I sought to get a replacement for the one lens that got badly scratched. I was told the law required that I get a new exam to get a replacement, since the lens I wanted replaced was from a prescription that from just over 2 years beforehand. At the time I was a middle-aged full-time grad student (switching careers) between jobs and could barely afford just the new lens, but not with the exam added on. The optometrist said that he was forbidden by law to supply what I wanted without a 'recent' exam. So I spent the next 2 years wearing a badly scratched lens, which was certainly less safe than having a new lens for the pair that served me well enough before the scratching, even if their prescription was technically outdated.
0 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
kono 11/29/2019 2:55:53 PM (No. 248651)
Then again, it wouldn't be beyond the realm of belief for Costco to charge 40 bucks in Toledo for something they charge more than 100 bucks for near Silicon Valley.
0 people like this.
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