Many low income American children suffer in pain because they cannot access basic health care. This is reality, and not to face it is to ignore a terrible truth about our country.
An important measure of a society's decency is how well it cares for its citizens. This standard is particularly critical for vulnerable groups like children.
The level of care that low income children receive through public programs can be seen as a critical marker of the success of the nation's publicly funded health insurance programs.
Low income children are likely to be covered by publicly-funded health insurance programs such as Medicaid, the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), and Social Security Insurance (SSI).
Last week in the
Boston Globe John Kerry described our collapsed health care system and how it impacts the most vulnerable among us--our children.
Healthcare for a family of four now costs more than a minimum-wage worker earns in a year. Certainly, things have gotten worse. Under this administration's watch, the number of uninsured Americans has grown by 6 million and premiums are up a whopping 73 percent.
This affects all of us. It matters if the kid down the block isn't immunized. It matters to your tax burden when simple, treatable illnesses turn into expensive emergency room visits -- often the only option for those without insurance. And it matters if we care about our moral obligation to others.
. . .Second, no child in America should lack health insurance. Leaving 11 million American children uninsured is wrong and, from the administration that brought us ``No Child Left Behind," it is breathtakingly hypocritical.
Most single moms raising two kids on $36,000 a year don't qualify for any help. My Kids First plan would change that, covering all children up to three times the poverty level.
http://www.boston.com/...
Medicaid offers the most comprehensive benefit package for low income children. Every state Medicaid program--including every Medicaid expansion SCHIP (State Children's Health Insurance Program) --is required to offer health services that cover "medically necessary" diagnostic and treatment services for chronic conditions, and "optional" Medicaid services as long as medical screening deems the services necessary, including dental care, physical and occupational therapy, prescription drugs, eyeglasses, rehabilitation, social work, and home nursing. By contrast, the benefit packages offered by separate SCHIP programs are more limited, often excluding services that are important to children.
But in America, the richest country on the planet, the promise of health care benefits does not necessarily translate to the reality of access to appropriate services.
This is from the Department of Health and Human Services web site.
Keep in mind the the Federal Employee Benefit Program is the health insurance program that our elected officials give themselves. Does anyone think Rick Santorum's eleven children or whatever he has, walk around in pain from untreated dental disease?
Dental services for the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) are an optional benefit under Title XXI of the Social Security Act for all children up to age 19. However, nearly all States have opted to provide coverage for dental services.
. . .States choosing to create a separate child health program may offer one of four benefit options: State may elect to provide benchmark coverage; benchmark equivalent coverage; existing coverage that is substantially equal to coverage under the Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan, the State employee plan or a health maintenance organization that has the largest, uninsured commercial non-Medicaid enrollment in the State. Benchmark equivalent coverage is coverage that, in the determination of the Secretary of Health and Human Services, provides appropriate coverage for the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) children.
http://www.cms.hhs.gov/...
Let's look under the hood. Let's see what kind of access is actually provided.
Alexis Shelton of Morro Bay lost her appetite and became whiny and unruly this summer because she had a toothache.
The 5-year-old's mouth ached and swelled for months while her mom, April Shelton, tried to find a dentist to treat her. Repeatedly, the distressed mom was turned away with only a prescription for antibiotics.
"I even took her to Las Vegas to try and get her help," April Shelton said.
http://www.sanluisobispo.com/...
This is what is happening to children in America today as you sit down with your coffee and open the Sunday Newspaper.
Shelton and her daughter are among thousands of San Luis Obispo County residents who must wait months to see a dentist or go without treatment because they lack dental insurance or have public insurance that nearly all private dentists won't accept.
Though dental servces are supposed to be covered, in reality they aren't. Most dentists will not treat patients on Medicaid. So children go to school in pain.
Poor access to dental care has been a persistent problem afflicting the 37 percent of San Luis Obispo County residents who lack dental insurance and 28,000 people, including 13,000 children, who have Denti-Cal insurance, the dental portion of Medi-Cal.
Nearly all private dentists in the county and state refuse to accept Denti-Cal because it pays poorly and is an administrative headache.
Three clinics in the county accept Denti-Cal insurance: the Nipomo and Templeton sites of Community Health Centers of the Central Coast Inc. and La Clinica de Tolosa in Paso Robles.
On rare occasions, a few private dentists will see Denti-Cal patients for emergencies, said Joe Mercardante, dental director at Community Health Centers.
"The biggest problem is the lack of providers to provide care to Denti-Cal patients," Mercardante said.
. . .In October 2005, Phipps led a screening of 841 children in Paso Robles elementary schools and found that more than half of kindergartners and third-graders had a history of dental decay. The decay in about one in five of those children was untreated.
"Having 20 percent of kids sitting in a classroom with tooth decay really isn't acceptable in a society such as ours," Phipps said.
And more on the same sad tragedy from the Galesburg-Register Mail, a newspaper serving central Illinois.
"I stopped taking public aid patients and my income doubled." - Dr. Lance Renfroe, dentist
GALESBURG - Pam Holmquist wants to spare her granddaughter embarrassment. And save the girl's smile.
"She's 11 years old and you know how kids are at that age," Holmquist said. "So I don't want to give you her name. I don't want the other kids to know she's on public aid.
"And I don't want them to know about her trouble with her teeth. She has an adult molar pushing through, but her baby tooth is hanging on."
Embarrassment is just the tip of the iceberg for Holmquist's granddaughter and many other children throughout Knox County.
She is one of 5,295 children in Knox County enrolled in Medicaid. And though she qualifies for dental care, she can't get it through the Knox County Health Department.
Greg Chance, public health administrator for the Knox County Health Department, learned this week that Dr. Kevin Rubnich declined the department's dentist position after accepting it in July. Dr. Rubnich was expected to start seeing Medicaid and other low-income patients in September.
The Knox County Health Department has been without a dentist since November 2004. Chance said he didn't know how many Medicaid recipients seeking dental care have been turned away because of the vacancy.
Holmquist's search for dental care is made tougher by the fact that few, if any, of the private practices accept Medicare recipients.
http://www.register-mail.com/...
Is this acceptable in the United States the richest country on the planet?
Do the children of our elected representatives go to school in pain?
Thank you for continuing to read about our American shame.