Parents of the profoundly disabled are profoundly troubled.
Beginning April 1, Medicaid will cover a total of 75 occupational, physical and speech therapy sessions annually. The health insurance program for the poor and disabled now covers a combined 225 of those therapies a year.
The reductions will be retroactive to July 2010, meaning some families already will have reached their yearly maximum before the cuts officially take effect.
Maybe if some of the Democrats in congress would actually READ the legislation before they vote on it, things like this might not happen.
“We have to pass it to know what’s in it.” – Pelosi
See an important article [url=http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/01/tick-tick-tick-cost-obamacare-time-bomb?category=17#ixzz1Bws2ipgi ]Tick, tick, tick: The cost of Obamacare is a time bomb[/url]. In particular, we have this excerpt:
[blockquote] David Bowen, former health staff director of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, is one of the Obamacare authors to admit the bill could be a time-bomb.
Three months after the bill passed, and after Bowen had left Capitol Hill, he gave a briefing at the K Street offices of the lobbying firm Sidley Austin — an event the firm billed as a “unique behind the scenes look at the development of this landmark legislation and [an opportunity] to hear an insider’s view about issues that the legislation left unresolved.”
Bowen compared the federal legislation to the Massachusetts legislation on the score of costs. “In Mass., [b]there was a very conscious decision to do coverage first, knowing that that would bring on a cost battle second,” the former Ted Kennedy aide explained. “We certainly made the same decision. This is a coverage bill, not a cost reduction bill.[/b] There is stuff here that will begin to address the issue of cost, but this is not a cost reduction bill with a bit of coverage on it — it is really trying to get coverage first.”
[/blockquote]
States see the time bomb nature of Obamacare. We can ignore the debate about CBO estimates which are contradicted by the chief Medicare/Medicaid actuary. Everyone can simply look at Romneycare to see what will happen. And remember that 1) it is easier to “game” Obamacare than Romneycare (wait to buy insurance till you have a medical disaster than drop it after recovery) and 2) half of Romneycare money came from the feds but there is no wealthy big daddy to Obamacare. Giving people Medicaid is a terrible inefficient way to shore up the safety net, and that is the issue – the safety net NOT insurance coverage. The sad irony is that the Obamacare mandate on states to vastly expand medicaid is that it will take away money from the community health centers that much more efficiently provide safety net care.
There is some temporary federal money to help states with exploding costs but they run out in 2015. (Why does that happen after the 2012 election? You don’t have to answer that.) As such, states such as Arizona, South Carolina, etc., that see the looming disaster are cutting back now.
The very idea that the federal government can foist unfunded mandates on the states is contrary to federalism. The states can’t print money like the feds. Likewise the states asking the federal government for a handout. The Santa Clause mentality rising from the Progressives and FDR’s New Deal is destroying this country particularly when combined with the phony accounting that is used to cover up the liabilities.
I am starting to wonder if we have gotten ourselves too far into the hole.
RE: “The sad irony is that the Obamacare mandate on states to vastly expand medicaid is that it will take away money from the community health centers that much more efficiently provide safety net care.”
Yes — but what states can do now is simply choose to opt out of Medicaid entirely. Spend the money that they are able to spend on the community health centers and let the Feds and their mandates go soak their toes.
Sarah is (as usual) right about states being able to opt out of Medicaid, and supposedly several states are considering this. The issue is if Texas, say, opts out, then Texans will be paying a portion of their federal taxes to provide Medicaid in California.
Speaking of unfunded mandates, hospitals are getting clobbered by unfunded mandates. ER’s can’t turn people away. As such, hospitals were definitely warm to the coverage not cost containment Obamacare.
[blockquote] Yes—but what states can do now is simply choose to opt out of Medicaid entirely. Spend the money that they are able to spend on the community health centers and let the Feds and their mandates go soak their toes. [/blockquote]
Interesting. So you are proposing we replace government health insurance with socialized medicine. What about the nursing homes? They would have to be closed as well.
#5 is correct, the only way we can materially cut the cost of care in the short run is to allow Emergency Rooms to turn the indigent away.