Posted on 05/13/2015 3:26:25 PM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
California is serving as the national model for President Barack Obama's health care reforms, but that won't continue unless the state does something about its abysmal Medi-Cal reimbursement rates for doctors and hospitals caring for the 12 million Californians with Medi-Cal coverage.
Gov. Jerry Brown has a golden opportunity to fix the problem Thursday when he unveils his May revised budget plan. But don't hold your breath.
It's becoming increasingly clear that the influx of 2.7 million Californians to the Medi-Cal roles is putting a strain on the state's medical system. The low reimbursement rates provide a disincentive for physicians to accept new patients.
Frustrated health care advocates are poised to put a tax initiative on the ballot -- possibly through an increase in the tobacco tax -- to generate sufficient funds to raise provider rates.
Increasing Medi-Cal reimbursement rates attract more doctors to the program, improve the overall health of Californians and help secure the success of health care reforms.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
How totally unexpected.
Talk about beating a dead horse. Maybe they should quit spending the money on anti-vaping ads an use what they already collect.
This type of situation will be used to screw up Medicare for the Citizens who played by the rules for 45 years only to be denied services because tens of millions of illegal immigrants who arrived here over the last 10-20 years piled on for one more freebie.
I’m not a smoker, and I find the tobacco taxes to be totally insane.
At what point is enough enough?
There must be Leftist smokers too. Why don’t we ever hear from them?
One-third of the state is parasitic, allowing working Americans to pay their medical bills. The solution? Raise the payments made for their medical care. Democrats worry about sustainability, but not when it comes to their spending of other people’s money.
The solution to everything is to raise taxes according to the merky-news.
Why would anyone take seriously an editorial board that can't spell "rolls".
I know, it's affirmative action editorializing. After all, it's not like their readership knows the difference.
I didn’t catch that, and it’s pathetic from an Editorial Board.
They also misspelled "illegal aliens"
CA is run by dim-bulb-crats who instinctively know how to solve this problem.
Print more money.
Just remember, dimbulbs, we’re coming for all of you when the SHTF.
So that's California's responsibility now?
And California smokers' responsibility, to boot?
-PJ
Unlike Obama, Jerry Brown can’t print money, and Brown’s only gonna be able to cook the books for so long.Looks like Medi-Cal tax-rate increases is what’s gonna finally sink California, not an earthquake, not a drought, and not a bunch of not-bullet trains to nowhere.
Hasn’t Brown recently said that he was going to allow illegals to enroll in Med-Cal?
Here in Aiken County, South Carolina, it is hard, if not impossible, to find Drs that will take Medicaid patients because the reimbursement rates are so low.
Most Medicaid patients are forced to go to a low cost clinic run by the gvt.
YOU are very sharp eyed ! That is what I love here on FR, the quality and intelligence of posters is just phenomenal
Doctors won’t work for nothing? Who knew?
“Make every physician accept MediCal as a condition of being licensed in the state.”
Brilliant! Then they could lower the Medi-Cal reimbursement rates to zero, which would totally solve the problem. And when all the physicians start to flee the state, why just pass another law that makes it illegal for them to leave the state!
Might as well include the illegals since nobody with Medi-Cal will get to see a doctor anyway. Doctors may well be forced into seeing all patients.
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