“And in each and every meeting she had
with me, our staff and with the working group, she would bring more reforms and
cuts for consideration. I truly believe without our team member, Patti
Bellock, at
the table the Medicaid package would have been so much weaker than then what
was signed into law.” - House Republican
Leader Tom Cross
Crocodile
Tears (“Patti & the Poor”) Pt. 2
Idiom: Crocodile
tears describe a false or bogus pretense of grief or sadness over a decision or
action. “It is proverbial that a
crocodile moans and sobs like a person in great distress in order to lure a man
into its reach, and then, after devouring him sheds bitter tears over the dire
fate of its victim” (Charles Funk. Hog
on Ice & Other Curious Expressions. Harper Colophon. 1985.) Even Shakespeare describes this common,
colloquial belief in his works on more than several occasions.
ON The Passage of the Medicaid Bill (SB2840)
“Some of my best friends” are
not homeless, but a good number of my friends are. After working in homeless shelters and acting
as a site manager for many years, I have come to know too many people who try to
exist on the street during the most intemperate
conditions. The winter is indeed a harsh
mistress. On the coldest evenings, we all
eat together, talk together, argue sports trades, discuss good and
less-than-good movies, question politics, tell a joke, share a story…in short,
we are just people – except for my better fortune. By and large, what separates my friends and
me is not necessarily “There but for the grace of God”; more likely it is “There for the grace of not having a medical
catastrophe…” In almost every case, there were no nets to
catch my friends from the “outrageous slings and arrows” of tumors, diabetes,
stroke, aneurism, and so on. I might
tell you, after Governor Quinn’s signature on the latest Medicaid cuts brought
to you by ALEC-award-winning Rep. Patti Bellock (Westmont) and Heather Steans
(Chicago), winter could be especially cruel this year.
In June,
Governor Quinn signed into law several bills that will enact huge cuts to the
health care services and Medicaid programs which deprive hundreds of thousands
of Illinois’ lowest income classes of residents from services and assistance
starting last month in July. Total costs
“saved” may include nearly $2.7 billion in multiple layers (www.sj-r.com/top-stories/1842810731/Winner-losers-in-2-7B-package-of-cuts-reforms). That’s a lot
of money – and it’s more than a lot of people.
Here’s what’s going to happen:
Nearly 3000 – 4000 children
will be removed from the universal income eligibility for offspring, a politically
unwanted and orphaned child of ex-Governor Blagojevich – albeit a saving grace
to thousands of lower income families before his fall from grace (www.
Sj-r.com/top-stories/x188778215/New-Medicaid-law-Needed-reform-or-Scrooge-like?zc_p=1).
More than 25,000 parents lost
Medicaid coverage as of July 1, 2012. A
bit more than the population of Representative Bellock’s constituency in
Westmont, Illinois.
According to reporter Christian Davion, $15
million provided for critical medical and in-home nursing will be cut for
families, which will now face insurmountable medical costs for full-time
hospitalization [rather than home ventilators, oxygen, feeding tubes, etc.] (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/jun2012/illi-j20.shtml).
Another $72.2 million will be
cut by eliminating Illinois Cares Rx, the state program that offers
prescription drug discounts to over 180,000 citizens from low-income households
who are elderly and/or suffer from disabilities. (www.
Sj-r.com/top-stories/x188778215/New-Medicaid-law-Needed-reform-or-Scrooge-like?zc_p=1).
Family Care for those
families (two person household) making more than $20,000 annually will see
their access to assistance stopped immediately.
While this may seem injurious
to those in the shady area that hovers just above a basic $20,000, Republican
Senator Dale Righter of Matoon, IL, rationalizes this as an appropriate line in
the sand: “We need to incentivize the providers to make the Medicaid population
healthier. To me, this is about pay for
performance” (www.
Sj-r.com/top-stories/x188778215/New-Medicaid-law-Needed-reform-or-Scrooge-like?zc_p=1). In other words, let’s target the most
desperate cases while eliminating the merely needy. With that logic, those struggling people
working at basic service jobs earning just over $20,000 annually are doing well
enough to no longer deserve medical assistance, even if they have kids.
Podiatric
services will also be curtailed – unless you can prove you are diabetic. My homeless friends slog through the deepest
and coldest wet snows without work (while looking) and without footwear
(desperately looking), and limp their way into shelters each evening. Want to hide out in the library? – Not
allowed. Go to an emergency room? – Not
for long. Stand in a foyer? – Keep
moving. The bottom line is stay on your
feet all day and keep walking. Now, if
you’re not a proven diabetic with paperwork - No more medical assistance.
Sadly, there’s more. Nursing Care advocates also warn that this
bill will jeopardize nursing home care as a result of cutting Medicaid
reimbursement rates for nursing home operators.
Behind closed doors, state officials working on the bill to cut Medicaid
costs agreed to lower the set levels of care that had existed prior to the
bill’s passage for care standards. That’s
right, reduced standards. State Senator
Jacqueline Collins noted, “They did an end run around the process. It was a disservice to the democratic
process. Clout, money, and influence
determined the outcome” (www.blog.levinperconti.com/2012/05/illinis_medicaid_cuts_could_a.html).
Of course, some of our “indigent
and chronic” are not without mental issues.
Did you think our legislators would find some port in the storm of cuts
for anyone hearing voices in his head? “The
National Alliance on Mental Illness has ranked Illinois as the number one state
in the US for budget cuts to mental health services for 2011, with the state
having eliminated 31 percent of its total budget since 2008. Including Quinn’s latest proposal for an
additional 40 percent in cuts from state mental health programs, which includes
shutting down six of the state’s twelve remaining mental health facilities. Illinois will have cut over 71 percent of its
funding for mental health services and programs over the past five years” (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/jun2012/illi-j20.shtml).
Sorry, my friends. And, if it is the “winter of their
discontent,”
not to worry; they are so
marginalized and without any political enfranchisement that whatever pain falls
on them will not make a mite of difference to the rest of us.
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