CNN Glosses Over Failure of Universal Health Care
Sometimes it’s all in the details, or the lack thereof.
A news brief on “CNN Newsroom” Oct. 17 said that
The screen said “
The state will stop funding the Keiki Care Plan, a basic health insurance program for some 2,000 children, beginning Nov. 1. The program was a public-private partnership with Hawaii Medical Service Association (HMSA), which will pay to cover the children through the end of 2008.
But the brief didn’t go into detail about one of the main reasons why the program was being axed: abuse of the “free” system.
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According to the Hawaii Reporter, the state administration was concerned about the Keiki Care Plan’s enrollment process because it didn’t make sure that children were ineligible for Medicaid and its superior benefits.
"People who were already able to afford health care began to stop paying for it so they could get it for free … I don't believe that was the intent of the program," Dr. Kenny Fink, the administrator for Med-QUEST at the Department of Human Services, said to the AP.
Dennis Smith commented on
“Does that sound familiar?” Smith asked. “That is precisely what Heritage warned against in last year’s debate on the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Shifting the cost from the private sector to the public sector does not increase insurance rates, it, well, merely passes the cost around like a proverbial hot potato.
Smith also pointed out that presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s proposal for universal coverage of children “has always been shaky for lack of specifics.”
“How do mandates work if there are no penalties as he responded in the most recent debate? His home state of
