A Health Care Access Comparison Worth Speaking Up About

In March 2013, the South Carolina House of Representatives turned down the opportunity to fund a "common sense" expansion of our SC Medicaid insurance safety-net program when it proposed its version of the state budget for fiscal year July 2013 - June 2014. And, the 80% of South Carolinians who live in urban areas will not be helped in accessing quality, affordable healthcare under the SC House’s alternate plan (endorsed by Governor Haley) which is to be funded with $80 million in the House's proposed FY 2013-2014 state budget.

Here it is May, and the SC Senate appears unlikely to incorporate SC Medicaid expansion into its version of the FY 2013-2014 state budget. Ah, well...

Yes, the "new" Medicaid expansion (as provided by the federal Affordable Care Act) would deliver a well-constructed package of "essential health benefits" to struggling, working South Carolinians who need it most to stay productive in their jobs and/or in their continuing education endeavors. And, where there are healthy adults in a household, there also does one find healthier dependent children.

So, take note:

• While our state government sees fit under existing law to provide "full-service" healthcare to almost 28,000 convicted lawbreakers housed in state prison facilities, at a state cost of over $2,000 per individual during state fiscal year July 2011- June 2012, our state government, by its actions, is saying that "we" as a state cannot afford to provide "essential benefits” healthcare to about 200,000 working, law-abiding South Carolina citizens starting in January 2014 through the "new" SC Medicaid expansion?
• Under the federal Affordable Care Act, the South Carolina state government cost for expanding SC Medicaid in state fiscal year 2013-2014 comes to only 92-cents per individual !!!  [and even, using very conservative estimates, by state fiscal year 2019-2020, state government cost for maintaining the SC Medicaid expansion is at most $670 per person (that’s assuming no new jobs and no positive economic ripple effect at all)]

Now, where is the JUSTICE in that comparison?  

What are our state leaders thinking? Would you believe that the average number of fully-paid medical treatments per year by the SC Department of Corrections for its prison facility inmates is 32 per year? I say, WOW!!! 

It's way past overdue for SC voters to hear these facts and be asking our state leaders why this glaring healthcare system disparity is being ignored in our state!!! 

Contact your neighbors and make these facts general knowledge in our state -- be a voice for healthcare justice in South Carolina now (and over the next year). Thank you!

"Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhumane" -- Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Know your SC Senator and SC House member -- http://www.scstatehouse.gov/legislatorssearch.php  

References:

SC Department of Corrections, Annual Accountability Report, Sept 2012 -- pages 38 and 41 

SC Department of Corrections, Average Daily Inmate Population Chart – Fiscal Years 1969-1970 thru 2011-2012, August 2012 

Report to the SC Hospital Association, Dec 2012 -- Table  2 (from Milliman Report)