A good meeting today April 23rd, thanks to Ulla from Tasmania. 7 attended.
What I learnt about Artabana is, in a nutshell, that it is almost the same as what I’ve been doing for the last 6 months since leaving my private health insurer (TUH) – putting $200 of my own money aside every month and using it to cover my health costs. I’ve got $1,000 saved and have some expenses coming up soon; dental and skin. So I am responsible for my own health care costs and savings. The same happens in Artabana, except I’m not doing it alone, and 30% of my savings go into an emergency fund that millions of people contribute to. That means, if I or anyone in Artabana has a major medical expense that Medicare is not adequate for, I can ask the Artabana network to cover it.
We will move forward with forming a group that covers a wide area initially from Brisbane to the NSW border, until the process of formation is further down the track and then, after more people have joined locally, we can splinter off into smaller groups… 12 is a good number, of people who trust and support each other and can meet face to face. Next meeting is June 30th Friday evening 7:30 pm.”

Further information can be found here on Alison Bird’s blog.