I understand the political pressures for Obama to make it clear that health care reform will not lead to spending tax payer’s money on illegal aliens, but this simply makes no sense. The White House now says that illegal aliens will not be able to purchase insurance through the new exchanges:
The White House on Friday said it would bar illegal immigrants from purchasing health coverage through a proposed insurance marketplace. But the administration also said that the federal government would continue to require hospitals to provide emergency treatment to illegal immigrants at taxpayer expense.
The question of how illegal immigrants would fare under a proposed overhaul of the health care system came into sharp focus on Wednesday during President Obama’s speech to Congress. Representative Joe Wilson, Republican of South Carolina, shouted “You lie!” when Mr. Obama insisted that his health care overhaul would not insure illegal immigrants.
And the Obama administration’s determination to show that immigrants will not benefit from the health system overhaul highlighted the extraordinary sensitivity to the issue at a time when lawmakers still remain divided over whether the government should pay to provide health coverage for all American citizens.
A White House spokesman, Reid Cherlin, said that the president’s proposals would bar illegal immigrants from purchasing private insurance through the new government marketplace, known as an exchange, and that verification of immigration status would be required for anyone seeking to purchase coverage.
Besides making no sense in principle to deny even illegal aliens the ability to purchase something with their own money, this might also have negative results for everyone else. Having more people, including illegal aliens, buying insurance increases the risk pool and would lower the cost. Not allowing illegal aliens to purchase insurance also increases the risk that they will require emergency room treatment at public expense. It would be advantageous for them to have medical coverage during future influenza epidemics to increase the chances they are vaccinated, potentially reducing spread of the disease.
This is an unnecessary way to demonstrate that Joe Wilson was wrong. Hopefully by the time the final legislation gets through Congress this idea will be forgotten.
Ron:
You’re right, instead of playing defense on this issue, Obama, Democrats and anybody else with half a brain should be educating the rest about the folly of denying anybody treatment.
Do the likes of Joe Wilson expect doctors and nurses to check immigration papers before treating an emergency condition or contagious disease? Will there be INS officers stationed at every clinic and hospitol to put the sick and injured on a bus to the Mexican border?
If they do get sick or injured, and get treated why not let them pay into the pool?
This is a perfect opportunity to demonstrate the inhumanity of the “right-winger.”
It’s not as if conservatives will see this, concede that Obama is not lying about illegal immigrants not receiving care from tax money, and then say they will support health care reform. Anyone who would see this decision as making sense is not going to support health care reform under any circumstance.
I knew that Obama was a moderate when I campaigned for him. I did not expect him to be spineless! Sure, his cooperative, bipartisan nature would be very effective if we had a semi-rational loyal opposition to bargain with but we don’t. The Republican Party has given itself over to sociopaths and racists … we cannot yield to the crazies.
Sadly, I now wish I had supported Hillary instead despite her hawkish tendencies.
The medical professions have to jump into this issue with both feet and explain why it’s dangerous (let alone immoral) to deny anybody treatment.
The problem is that the immigration issue is one where both political parties (or at least a significant portion of their constituencies) are equally divorced from reality. Nativism is a popular brand of bigotry in many parts of the country, and it crosses party lines cheerfully. While the Republican Party, with its primarily Southern white male constituency, is certainly the worst offender of the pair it is just not possible to let the Democrats off the hook here either.
The immigration issue thus becomes a convenient wedge issue which can then be used to attack any social program. Either Democrats must take a position on the immigration issue at the risk of shifting the debate away from the program on the table or they must refute charges that the program will benefit illegal aliens and assume a nativist position themselves, with the potential political consequences that entails.
The Republicans don’t care whether the program benefits undocumented aliens or not. They are against the program. What they care about is to force the Democrats to play the game on the immigration court instead of the health care court.
Its time to re-examine instant citizenship (Anchor babies) which hasn’t been illuminated enough, to growing concern of the American public. For decades now pregnant women have arrived on tourist’s visas, through the fence and even at ports of call. Very aware of our mis-interpreted law governing “birthright citizenship”, that attributes full rights to the Mother of an illegal immigrant. How can Americans benefit from this Health care reform package, when we must subsidize millions of households and not just the original interloper? Outlined in the spring issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons is an article that will stun a prudent person. An illegal alien entered the states in 1997 to work as a fruit picker, bringing with him his wife and three children; all illegal aliens.
The lady gave birth to a fourth child, and with that birth the family had an “anchor baby”—an American citizen by birth, who provided the entire family with a free pass to remain in the United States permanently and collect government, subsides. Unfortunately the baby was born prematurely, spent three months in the neonatal incubator, and cost the San Joaquin Hospital more than $300,000. Meanwhile, the oldest daughter married an illegal alien and gave birth to her own anchor baby, and then Cristobal’s wife gave birth to yet another baby. ALL PAID FOR BY—YOU!
This is just one taxpayer example of the ‘Rule of law’ that has cost taxpayers billions of dollars. A nurse admitted last weekend, according to Review-Journal reported that cash-strapped UMC hospital in Nevada is providing more than $20 million a year in emergency dialysis care for uninsured, illegal immigrants. Is American society insane when poverty stricken Americans are turned away, go bankrupt and sometimes die? TAXPAYERS ARE TAXED FOR THIS, BUT NOT FOR OUR OWN PEOPLE? We must insist that a Birthright Citizenship lawsuit be filed with the federal court and its original intent revisited? That E-Verify should be fully funded and a highly skilled MIT team, building on the original Immigration enforcement database to a highest level of security that cannot be compromised by the use of fraudulent documents.
The PC oriented application must be installed permanently on every business computer across this country? ICE should have the manpower to audit every workplace, with the power to arrest and detain employers who snub immigration laws? Repeat offenders should be dealt with harshly, including prison and confiscation of business assets. There should be no mitigating excuses because illegal immigrants are—STEALING JOBS– on any rung of the employment ladder? These employers for years have been an intended magnet for destitute labor in many cases, but have left the burden of paying for schooling for the children, health care and a veiled miscellaneous core of government handouts to US taxpayers. THIS IS NOT ABOUT RACISM, BUT AN ULTIMATE FINANCIAL MATTER OF SURVIVAL FOR US ALL!
Insist your politicians guarantee E-Verify is fully funded and is not scuttled by Sen. Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Janet Napolitano or any other high ranking Democrats. The Washington switchboard has their number at 202-224-3121. Research these laws, true facts and incredulous stats at NUMBERSUSA & JUDICIAL WATCH
‘THIS IS NOT ABOUT RACISM, BUT AN ULTIMATE FINANCIAL MATTER OF SURVIVAL FOR US ALL!’
I’d be more likely to believe this if not for statements like this one:
‘Is American society insane when poverty stricken Americans are turned away, go bankrupt and sometimes die? TAXPAYERS ARE TAXED FOR THIS, BUT NOT FOR OUR OWN PEOPLE?’
This is the kind of superior, ranting racist propaganda spewn by nativists with no understanding of this issue. Indigent illegals are treated the same way by emergency rooms as indigent citizens and are accepted or turned away in roughly the same numbers, which vary by hospital. Some hospitals do a good job of providing emergency room service to patients unable to pay at point of purchase and some really fail to live up to the Hippocratic Oath.
There are specific ‘sanctuary’ organizations that specifically take in illegals unable to get medical help anywhere else, but none of them receive federal tax money. Some do receive state or municipal tax money, if the local or state government feels very strongly on the issue. These organizations are mostly visited by illegals, because they were specifically designed for that purpose, but they do not turn away poor Americans if they need help. They take everyone who comes in the door, to the best of their capacity.
Claiming otherwise is a pretty blatantly racist statement, and adding the disclaimer that it has nothing to do with race is simply the self-awareness of a tender conscience trying to deflect the truth.
Look no further then Emergency Medical
Treatment and Active Labor Act of 1985 (EMTALA).
This act guarantees that every ED treats anyone who enters with an emergency, including cough, headache, hangnail, cardiac arrest, herniated lumbar disc, drug addiction, alcohol overdose, gunshot wound, automobile trauma, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive infection, mental problem, or personality disorder.
The definition of emergency is flexible and vague enough to include almost any condition. Any patient coming to a hospital ED requesting emergency care must be screened and treated until ready for discharge, or stabilized for transfer whether or not insured, documented, or able to pay. A woman in labor must
remain to deliver her child.
http://www.jpands.org/vol10no1/cosman.pdf