Health care for uninsured faces big hit as Washington Legislature prepares to meet in special sessio…
by admin on Nov.26, 2011, under Life and Health insurance
By Kristine Guerra, The Oregonian The Oregonian
View full size Ross William Hamilton/The Oregonian Debbie Pain, of Woodland, Wash., and Rich Enders converse in an examination room at the Free Clinic of Southwest Washington. Pain is one uninsured Clark County residents who visits the Free Clinic for basic medical services. Gov. Chris Gregoire is proposing to eliminate subsidized health care for the poor to bridge a $2 billion budget gap. Already at capacity, the Free Clinic would be inundated with uninsured individuals who can’t get health service anywhere else — if the cuts happen.
Kitty Cook has been on a hunt for a job - and health insurance - since she got laid off two years ago. She even went back to school to retrain. She’s had dozens of interviews, but no job offer.
The Vancouver resident said companies aren’t going to hire a 60-year-old.
Cook is one of more than 40 uninsured patients who crowded the Free Clinic of Southwest Washington on Tuesday evening. The clinic is a nonprofit organization that provides health services for free. Every day, people line up outside the building because they have nowhere else to go, even for basic medical care. Cook said she comes to the clinic to get medication for flu and muscle pain in her shoulder and right arm.
Already at capacity, the Free Clinic, which receives no state funding, likely will be inundated with many more patients if the state budget scenario plays out as expected after the special session of the legislature convenes Monday. Last month, Gov. Chris Gregoire proposed eliminating health services to low-income individuals and people with disabilities to help bridge a $2 billion budget hole.
Those cuts remained in place this week when the governor released a revised budget proposal. Without the basic health plan for the low-income uninsured and the Disability Lifeline program for the uninsured employed, the state would save about $130 million. But thousands in Clark County would lose access to medical care - and nonprofits like the Free Clinic would struggle to fill the need.
“Eliminating subsidized health care would dramatically increase the burden on safety-net clinics like ours,” said Patrick Callahan, the Free Clinic’s director. “There isn’t going to be much room for us to see more people.”
Also, without state-funded medical coverage, more people would seek medical care at emergency rooms, where the cost of providing the same kinds of service is far more expensive, said Carrie Vanvant, regional vice president of Sea Mar Community Health Center . Sea Mar, another nonprofit center, also provides free medical care and administers the state-funded basic health plan for the poor at about 26 Washington locations. The Vancouver location sees about 500 patients a week.
“The cost will be magnified,” Vanvant said.
Eliminating the basic health plan “would bottleneck the ability of hospitals to provide urgent-care services,” Vanvant said. “For the clinic, what will happen is it will reduce our funding ability to provide preventive health care. It trickles down to families who no longer have medicines available to them.”
Last year Sea Mar served about 28,000 low-income people in Clark County. The center already has a yearlong waiting list for the basic health plan.
“If the program is eliminated, the waiting list would just be a joke,” Vanvant said. “It will be a waiting list for nothing.”
And that’s just for the basic health plan.
Sea Mar also administers the state-funded Disability Lifeline program, which is for “those folks who don’t have health insurance from their current employers,” Vanvant said.
The Disability Lifeline program and basic health plan are among several public health programs the governor’s budget proposal would cut or eliminate entirely.
State funding that Clark County Public Health receives for HIV prevention, maternity support services, immunizations and chronic disease prevention, among others, also might be cut. Local health officials will know more at the end of the year after the monthlong special session ends.
Callahan said that, without these services, low-income people who can’t get private insurance and can’t afford to pay out-of-pocket would simply not seek medical care.
“They’re going to wait longer and longer and longer,” he said, “until it’s too late.”
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