Arizona Drops Children’s Health Program (scream)

[ensho]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/19/health/policy/19arizona.html


Arizona on Thursday became the first state to eliminate its Children’s Health Insurance Program when Gov. Jan Brewer signed an austere budget that will leave nearly 47,000 low-income children without coverage.

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State leaders said they were left with few choices because of a $2.6 billion projected shortfall next year. But hospital officials and advocates for low-income people said they were worried that emergency rooms would be overrun by patients who had few other options for care, and that children might suffer enduring developmental problems because of inadequate medical attention.

The cuts also mean the state will forgo hundreds of millions of dollars in federal matching aid, and could lose far more if Congress passes a health bill that requires states to maintain eligibility levels for the two programs.

Ms. Brewer, a Republican, has warned that more cuts will be needed if voters do not approve a referendum in May to raise the sales tax by a penny for three years, to 6.6 cents per dollar.

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The Republican-controlled Legislature passed the budget last week, based largely on a proposal from the governor that included deep cuts to both health care and education. With state revenues down a third since 2007, the $8.9 billion budget reduced spending by about $1.1 billion.

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“They really are standing alone in cutting children off during the downturn,” Ms. Guyer said. “It’s going to have long-term consequences that will be there for kids long after Arizona’s budget situation gets better.”
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the children should be the very LAST to be cut!

care less republicans.

[Posteritatis]

1. (string of obscenities) (nt)

[MineralMan]

8. (Gentle chiding for use of said obscenities) (nt)

[lonestarnot]

2. The pigliCON's eat babies first off the plate.

Old people on medicare next.

[Nickster]

3. Pukes love the fetus, but hate the child.

[ensho]

4. ain't that the truth

nt

[louis-t]

5. So a repug is holding children hostage

unless she gets a tax INCREASE? Damn 'tax and spend' conservatives. :sarcasm:

[MineralMan]

6. What I imagine is being said in the cloakroom in AZ:

"Well, see, the people paying taxes in Arizona are all old retired folks who moved here from Minnesota and places like that. The only Arizonans having babies are those illegal aliens and welfare cases. Maybe if we stop paying for their brats medical care they'll go back where they came from."

Yup, I think that's about how it goes in those cloakrooms, with McCain standing in the back of the room nodding.

[ensho]

7. kick

nt

[Fla Dem]

9. I always wonder when states cut health care and education to reduce their budgets

if they also take a cleaver to expenses associated with the legislatures. Are reps' pay cut, or were they required to reduce staff? Are their benefits reduced? Are their perks reduced? When I worked for a corporation and there was cost cutting, those were the first things reduced.