Until recently, Oscar did the household grocery shopping and even made simple meals, lovingly serving the afternoon cafecito. They got by with a home health aide provided through Oympia’s Medicaid long-term managed care plan who visited the home a few hours a day. In February, however, Oscar was hospitalized with pneumonia and diagnosed with mesothelioma, a lung cancer contracted from exposure to asbestos in the shipyards where he once worked. Due to his age and advanced state of illness, he is very weak, and no longer able to care for his wife.
 
Their son, Oscar Morales, Jr., who has provided major financial support for his parents in their retirement, had to leave his job in Mexico to try to help his parents navigate the healthcare system. Oscar has found himself bounced around and utterly confused by the system. But he could only manage to get two more hours of care, an increase from four hours per day to six hours per day.

”My parents really need full-time care at this point,” he said. “They are both weak and in wheelchairs. My father is mostly bed-ridden and my mother often has trouble breathing and can only take a few steps without experiencing severe pain and breathlessness.”
 
The son has sought help from both local and state agencies in an effort to get more care. Oscar describes his frustration: “Phones are not answered and messages not returned for days or not at all.”
 
Oscar fears his parents will need to be hospitalized or put in a nursing home. “This is a terrible fate any time, but it is now unthinkable with the deadly coronavirus in the community.”
 
Olympia and Oscar just want to be together, and live out their lives peacefully, with their pets nearby in the safety and security of their own home. After a lifetime of hard work, without enough home health care they will be unable to do so.