Thread: Two-pronged burden

http://www.chieftain.com/editorial/1152695720/2

Two-pronged burden
EDITORIAL
THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN
TWO GROWING burdens on Colorado taxpayers - health coverage for eligible citizens and federally mandated emergency care for illegal immigrants - have converged to make Medicaid a huge problem for the state budget.

Colorado's Medicaid yearly costs are around $3 billion, roughly split evenly between the federal and state governments. Medicaid is the second largest single hit on the state budget, topped only by public education.

To make matters worse, the feds impose contradictory mandates. On the one hand, they declare illegal immigrants ineligible for full Medicaid coverage, yet on the other, they require state Medicaid programs to pay for emergency medical care for all low-income people - legal or not.

The feds do share in the cost of emergency room visits by illegal immigrants even though it flies in the face of the general prohibition against Medicaid eligibility for the delivery of non-emergency health services.

Gov. Bill Owens reports the biggest federal mandate by far is still public education. In 2004, it cost Colorado taxpayers $235 million for non-citizen students and another $329 million for the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants in the public schools.

However, the governor's figures also show that Medicaid is a growing problem that needs attention. He cites a legislative budget analysis that 41 percent of all births paid for by Medicaid in Colorado are for non-citizens. That's more than 8,500 births annually at a cost of $3,552 per delivery - a total in excess of $30 million a year, according to the governor.

It may be politically incorrect to say so, but 8,500 illegal immigrant births a year seem to discredit the pro-immigrant argument that most of them are here working and not receiving public benefits.

In addition, Medicaid fraud has been known to occur, so it's not unreasonable to assume that at least some of it may be perpetrated by people who already have broken the law by entering the country illegally.

Medicaid has grown into a festering sore - probably the worst one facing the state budget over the long term. The state cannot let the problem get even worse by ignoring illegal immigration's part in it.

Nursing homes in my state have had to run on their own funds for two months. The state is not making payments just promises.

Call yours and ask how it's going.