Never was so much denied for so many by so few.
After years of study, two Medicaid expansion alternatives have been recommended to the Utah Legislature. But these alternatives don’t solve Utah’s coverage gap. Rather, these proposals would leave thousands more Utah families without access to health insurance.
The Legislature’s Health Reform Task Force has recommended two skimpy plans that would provide insurance to about 10,700 Utahns in 2016. Meanwhile, over 53,000 Utah families who work and pay taxes currently can’t get health insurance. They don’t receive or can’t afford employer-sponsored insurance, and they’re ineligible to purchase subsidized private health insurance. Instead, they seek care in ERs and pay bankruptcy-inducing bills for doctor visits and medications. And when they can’t pay their bills, the cost of their care is shouldered by every insured Utahn — up to $1,000 extra per family.
The task force decided that only one-fifth of the Utahns in the coverage gap should get insurance by limiting enrollment to only the “medically frail,” thus telling a Utah mom diagnosed with breast cancer that she can’t get coverage if her cancer is only Stage 1. “Come back when your cancer reaches Stage 4, then we’ll cover you.”
Amazingly, the task force recommendations ignored the Healthy Utah Plan developed by Gov. Herbert that both closes the coverage gap and returns $260 million per year in our taxpayer dollars to support Utah’s health care system.
Here are three reasons why the Utah Legislature should pass the Healthy Utah Plan during this legislative session:
First, it makes medical sense, which should motivate legislators who are also health care providers. Providing consistent care through a doctor’s office is the best way to identify and treat chronic conditions. These conditions are the illnesses that cost our health care system so much time and money.
Second, it makes economic sense, which should motivate every legislator. A recent study by the Colorado Hospital Association showed that hospitals in states that expanded coverage decreased their unpaid bills by an average of $1 million. Meanwhile, hospitals in non-expansion states saw their charity spending increase by an average of $400,000.
Implementing the Healthy Utah Plan will require state funding. But the first year would actually create $2 million in savings, followed by minimal costs for the next two years of the three-year-pilot. If the program continues, the state cost will reach $55 million in 2021, only about 10 percent of the state’s current Medicaid budget.
Third, it makes moral sense to provide health care for the uninsured. Bishop John C. Wester of the Catholic Diocese said, “No human being is expendable, no family is disposable.” The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in a public statement said, “We hope the discussion and decisions taken in this matter will be consistent with the God-given principles regarding care for the poor and the needy that in the end benefit all of His children,” and that “the lack of access to healthcare can impair a person’s ability to provide for self and family.”
Telling a Utah mom that she has to get sicker to get coverage — imperiling not only her health, but also the stability of her family — is not consistent with common sense or the traditions of any religion or code that values human life and dignity.
I ask the Utah Legislature to consider the medical, economic and moral imperatives of Utah’s coverage gap. I urge you, the readers, to go to www.coverthegap.org to send a personalized message to your legislators urging them to support the common-sense solution that is the governor’s Healthy Utah Plan.
Tom Metcalf is a retired pediatrician living in Salt Lake City.