In response to: Obama’s new policy deserves a chance from July 3, 2012:

Dear Max,

Thank you for your excellent opinion piece in the 7/3-7/10 edition of the Arizona Summer Wildcat.

President Obama’s healthcare plan literally saved my life. I am a 44-year-old woman living well below the poverty line. (I earn less than $200 a week before taxes, but I am blessed in that I truly love, and am very skilled at, my job.)

Prior to the changes already being put in place by Obamacare, I would never have been eligible for or approved for AZ AHCCS, due to far too many complicated pre-existing medical conditions.

I had thyroid surgery on June 7 to remove the left lobe of my thyroid, due to a nearly three centimeter cluster of nodules which were deemed to be pre-cancerous. Had I not had that surgery, I am quite sure that I would have eventually died from cancer, as I have absolutely no resources (and my AHCCS just expired on June 30).

To anyone who says that healthcare is not a human right, I would like to say in return that perhaps they are not quite human.

—Salome Valentine, Tucson resident