Scores of families facing the prospect of bankruptcy if they lose health insurance for their disabled children urged legislators yesterday to fight Gov. Mark Schweiker's proposal to restrict Medical Assistance eligibility.
About 150 people turned out for the Consumer Health Coalition's meeting Downtown to talk about the budget proposal, which includes Medical Assistance cuts that would deprive an estimated 7,500 people of benefits.
In particular, the meeting highlighted the concerns of so-called "loophole" kids, about 1,000 children across the state whose parents have annual incomes of more than $100,000.
State officials have defended removing these children from the insurance program, arguing that their families have more financial resources than others covered by Medical Assistance. But some of the affected families held up posters yesterday showing the cost of their children's health care -- and how those costs are so large as to exhaust and even eclipse their incomes.
That's true for David Lovely, 39, of Greensburg. His family of six has a household income of just over $100,000 per year, but the annual health care tab for his autistic son Collin is $117,672.
That money buys the 3-year-old speech therapy, occupational therapy and 40 hours per week of "wraparound" support, which supplements therapy. It also lets Collin attend a special feeding program at the Children's Institute.
Because Collin's autism was caught at an early age, Lovely hopes continued therapy will enable his son to function independently as an adult. But that can only happen with Medical Assistance, his father said.
Sen. Jay Costa Jr., D-Forest Hills, and Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, expressed sympathy for the families and vowed to fight Schweiker's plan. They also criticized cuts that would eliminate two other classes of Medical Assistance beneficiaries as well as delays in new health programs funded by Pennsylvania's share of the national settlement with tobacco makers.
"The governor's proposed budget is one of the most cynical documents I've come across," Frankel said. While the budget doesn't raise taxes, it effectively does the same thing by shifting costs back to local governments and to vulnerable individuals, he said.
Frankel suggested the budget would be better balanced by drumming up new revenue, either by increasing taxes on cigarettes or allowing slot machines at state race tracks.
The state government was resourceful just this week, Costa acknowledged after the meeting, in finding a pot of money from which doctors and hospitals will annually receive $40 million to offset the rising costs of medical malpractice insurance. The money comes from traffic fines amassed in the state's automobile catastrophic loss fund; some have quipped that the state was, in essence, taking money from bad drivers to pay for bad doctors.
The consumers in the spotlight yesterday also could have benefited from that money, Costa said, but the two health-care needs were never considered side-by-side.
Wherever the money comes from, it is needed desperately, said Lori McMaster of Pine. McMaster's 7-year-old son Ethan uses $79,000 per year in services. Noting signs around the room that listed similarly high health care tabs -- $54,000, $83,000, $87,000 -- McMaster said: "These costs would bankrupt our families."
