How the Healthcare Bill Will Hurt Los Angeles

[Better Believe It]

How the Healthcare Bill Will Hurt L.A.
by Jon Wiener
January 11, 2010

Los Angeles County has more uninsured people than anyplace else in the country – three million, many of them immigrants, and many of those undocumented. If the Senate version of health bill passes, with its ban on federal coverage of non-citizens, a million people in California will be denied health insurance--the great majority of them in L.A.

That would be a disaster for Los Angeles.

The Senate bill, like the House version, would create insurance exchanges and give federal subsidies to low-income people to buy their own coverage. The Senate bill, however, would prohibit those who are not U.S. citizens from participating in the exchanges. The House bill is slightly better -- it allows legal immigrants who aren't citizens to buy insurance through the exchange, although it denies them federal subsidies.

Both Senate and House bills will hurt Los Angeles, as Tim Rutten pointed out in the L.A. Times: "Neither version makes any provision for undocumented immigrants."

The three million L.A. residents who lack health insurance now get their medical care mostly from emergency rooms at county hospitals. Those hospitals have an ethical and practical obligation to provide health care to the ill and injured even if they aren't insured. The federal government currently subsidizes their care at hospitals with "disproportionate" numbers of such patients, including those in L.A.. The House bill, Rutten reports, reduces those federal payments only modestly, but the Senate bill requires deep cuts.

That means L.A. county will pay for a lot more of the medical expenses of undocumented residents. And L.A. county doesn't have a lot more money to pay for anything right now.

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/515049/how_the_healthcare_bill_will_hurt_l_a

[Adsos Letter]

1. And I thought one of the purposes of HCR was to lower the financial burden

of using ER's as primary care points. Silly me.

[Better Believe It]

2. You clearly were wrong!

[Donnachaidh]

3. but but but -- it's HISTORICAL!!!!!!!!!

:rofl: :rofl:

[FLAprogressive]

5. The Nation is not a reliable source.

The only source you can believe is Obama himself, as He is the only One who speaks the Truth.

[FLAprogressive]

4. The Nation is a right wing rag.....

:rofl:

[2 Much Tribulation]

6. It's terrible to discriminate against permanent residents (usually spouses of citizens) n/t