HONOLULU – Hawaii is dropping the only state universal child health care program in the country just seven months after it launched. Government Health Care doesn't work... Hurry! Someone tell Obama.Gov. Linda Lingle's administration cited budget shortfalls and other available health care options for eliminating funding for the program. A state official said families were dropping private coverage so their children would be eligible for the subsidized plan.
"People who were already able to afford health care began to stop paying for it so they could get it for free," said Dr. Kenny Fink, the administrator for Med-QUEST at the Department of Human Services. "I don't believe that was the intent of the program."
State officials said Thursday they will stop giving health coverage to the 2,000 children enrolled by Nov. 1, but private partner Hawaii Medical Service Association will pay to extend their coverage through the end of the year without government support.
"We're very disappointed in the state's decision, and it came as a complete surprise to us," said Jennifer Diesman, a spokeswoman for HMSA, the state's largest health care provider. "We believe the program is working, and given Hawaii's economic uncertainty, we don't think now is the time to cut all funding for this kind of program."
Hawaii lawmakers approved the health plan in 2007 as a way to ensure every child can get basic medical help. The Keiki (child) Care program aimed to cover every child from birth to 18 years old who didn't already have health insurance — mostly immigrants and members of lower-income families.
It costs the state about $50,000 per month, or $25.50 per child — an amount that was more than matched by HMSA.
State health officials argued that most of the children enrolled in the universal child care program previously had private health insurance, indicating that it was helping those who didn't need it.
The Republican governor signed Keiki Care into law in 2007, but it and many other government services are facing cuts as the state deals with a projected $900 million general fund shortfall by 2011.
While it's difficult to determine how many children lack health coverage in the islands, estimates range from 3,500 to 16,000 in a state of about 1.3 million people. All were eligible for the program.
"Children are a lot more vulnerable in terms of needing care," said Democratic Sen. Suzanne Chun Oakland. "It's not very good to try to be a leader and then renege on that commitment."
The universal health care system was free except for copays of $7 per office visit.
1 comment:
I come from the UK and the idea that government health care doesn't work is true but public healthcare works brilliantly. The NHS is run largely separately from each other and the state and provides an excellent service on the whole.
Especially when you consider the amount that big business insurance companies would like to thieve from you if you didn't have the NHS cover.
It's no secret to most of the other developed countries that the US is dog eat dog world which doesn't care about poor people or unhealthy, which as a supposedly Christian country is ridiculous.
The rich in your country and in most countries inherited their money or the prospects required to become rich, how can you argue against that?
“For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
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