An Oklahoma man who lost an eye and a leg in Iraq says the giant insurance company AIG refused to provide him a new plastic leg and fought to keep from paying for a wheelchair or glasses for the eye in which he has 30 percent vision.

“They bought the cheapest thing that they could get away with,” said 51-year old John Woodson, a truck driver for the KBR contracting firm who lost his leg when his truck hit a roadside bomb in Iraq.

The ABC spin here is that this is more of a bailout scandal; they’re playing the “greedy AIG” angle, in that they used their bailout money for bonuses while folks like this are getting screwed.

The real story, though, is that even if AIG were perfectly financially healthy, Woodson would most likely still be getting screwed like this. Of course he got the cheapest thing they could give him. That’s what for-profit health coverage does — it tries to increase profit in any way possible.

Hell, I’m surprised they didn’t just send him a couple of rubber bands and a long stick. 

The story also provides us with a neat little encapsulation of why just requiring everyone to buy health insurance won’t do anything other than drive up insurance company profits:

 Woodson is covered by AIG under a government-mandated program that provides medical and disability benefits for employees working for U.S. contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. AIG covers about 90 percent of the claims for overseas workers.

The problem isn’t with access to insurance; anyone can buy a crappy, worthless policy that won’t cover a damn thing. The problem is with access to care, and just yelling “Yay! Everyone has insurance now! Crisis over!” won’t change that. The vast majority of the population will still experience what Woodson and tons of others are experiencing: poor quality and limited access.

But supposedly we can’t have socialized medicine, because that would lower the quality of, and limit our access to, our glorious free-market health care system. Got it.