Census brings health care crisis to light
Wednesday, September 6, 2006 7:27 AM PDT
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E-mail this articleNew Census Bureau data released this month show a steadily worsening health-care crisis. The number of uninsured Americans hit a record high 46.6 million in 2005. Most concerning, the number of uninsured children increased for the first time in almost a decade.
Providing health care for children younger than 18 had been the one fix Congress and the states had pulled off with relative success -- providing Medicaid coverage for poor families and, in 1997, creating the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to provide coverage for children of families that did not qualify for Medicaid but earned too little to afford health insurance.
The creation of SCHIP immediately reversed what had been an upward trend of uninsured children. Almost 4 million children were signed up for health coverage in the state-federal program's first six years, according to The Washington Post. But the rate of sign-ups slowed three years ago, as state's began to reduce matching-fund contributions to both Medicaid and SCHIP to cope with post-9/11 budget shortfalls.
Washington was among those states that used administrative red tape to cut its health-care bill. The state imposed a stricter application process in 2003, effectively dropping some 62,000 children from Medicaid coverage over the following two years.
The short-term budget savings realized through such policies has long-term consequences. These newly uninsured children and adults still require medical care when they fall ill. Without a primary physician, they tend to get sicker before they seek care. Then they show up at emergency rooms, where the care is far costlier than a visit to a doctor's office.
Between March 2003 and March 2004, for example, the amount of charity and unpaid care provided by Washington hospitals increase 52 percent. Longview's St. John Medical Center wrote off $6.8 million in charity cases last year. These unpaid bills ultimately increase the cost of health care for everyone.
It's clear from this new census data that Congress has to renew SCHIP next year, when it's due to expire. Faced with a growing number of uninsured children, there really is no choice but to continue this federal-state program. Beyond that, Congress must begin to confront the underlying cause of this problem -- the soaring cost of medical care.
Washington now spends about $3 billion a year to provide health care for hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians, the overwhelming majority of them children. And still, the ranks of the uninsured continue to grow.
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