…and it got me to thinking.

The man has access—for the rest of his life—to the best health care in the world (evident by the fact that he is still alive (assuming there’s been no Weekend At Bernie’s tomfoolery going on these past 10 years)). And not that he shouldn’t, of course, since Being Fundamentally Evil And Covertly Murderous isn’t a reason for an insurance company to deny you coverage.

The real issue is why shouldn’t the rest of us have access to even the most basic health care, too?

Anyway, I wrote about why I’m incensed over at The Women’s Colony. Check it out and see if you don’t agree. And if you wait long enough, the conservatives will come slithering along to tout their I-Got-Mine attitude throughout the comments section.  Some of them will probably call me names, too. Oh, goody!

In the meantime, people, IT’S FRIDAY and I don’t have to go to my shit-sucking job!!! And my friend Justin posted the following video to my Facebook wall today so things are really lookin’ up. Gosh darn it, if I don’t adore Olivia Newton John. She was, and still is, totally awesome. Watch this and be happy with me despite all the craptastic news, won’t you?

This week, the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPTF) released a new set of recommendations for breast cancer screening that turns on it’s head what women have come to expect as far as screening for breast cancer, the second leading cause of death in American women.

Recommending that women not receive mammograms until the age of 50 and then once every other year after that, the USPSTF has concluded that “the current evidence is insufficient to assess the additional benefits and harms of clinical breast examination beyond screening mammography in women 40 years of age or older.”

That part about “current evidence is insufficient to assess the additional benefits and harms” raised my eyebrows. Insufficient evidence to make a call either way? So that means this influential panel upends the current protocol—mammograms every one to two years beginning at age 40— instead of sticking with it?

*Shakes head.*

Call me crazy but the new guideline instantly made me think this is has something to do with money. But what really got my hackles up was this next part about how the USPSTF “recommends against clinicians teaching women how to perform breast self-examination.”

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat?!? As if the first part of this announcement wasn’t disturbing enough on its own, this second bit feels utterly irresponsible and lazy and callous and pitiable and oy vey, I need a drink. Or a bong hit. Or a shopping spree at Anthropologie with Michael Bloomberg’s credit card.

Now, perhaps there’s a reasonable reason for postponing mammograms. Probably not, given all that copious “insufficient evidence,” but I’m willing to suspend disbelief for a moment and offer a one-time-only benefit of a doubt on this one. I’m feeling generous today. But how, how, HOW can it be bad for a woman to learn what her normal breast tissue feels like? Someone? Anyone? Bueller? Because if you know normal breast tissue when you feel it, you will know abnormal breast tissue when you feel it. You feel me? Which makes me think immediately of my friend Amanda.

Isn’t she gorgeous? Vivacious? Young? Indeed. Gorgeous, vivacious, young Amanda found a lump in her breast with her very own fingers  and was diagnosed with stage-3b breast cancer when she was just 27 years old.

Amanda is a breast cancer survivor. You can read Amanda’s story here.

I’m curious to know: How do you women (and my male readers, too) feel about this dramatic shift in women’s health care? Do you feel like maybe we’re getting the shaft? Just a little?

Here’s a short clip of the compelling twenty minute interview.