March 3rd, 2009

Reports the Philadelphia Inquirer:

Even as the state struggles with a growing budget deficit, senators yesterday questioned why the Rendell administration is proposing to cut at least $20 million to hospitals that disproportionately serve Medicaid patients as well as the uninsured poor.

At a budget hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee, both Democratic and Republican senators expressed concerns about Gov. Rendell’s proposal to slash payments to those hospitals by roughly 15 percent in his proposed $29 billion budget for 2009-10.

Public Welfare Secretary Estelle Richman, whose department oversees those Medicaid payments, said she was “very sensitive to the fact that our hospitals are feeling the impact” of the state’s budget problems.

But, she said, “we are constantly told [the department's] budget is too high and too big. . . . We have to make cuts.”

Affected by the proposed cut would be 120 hospitals, in small towns and big cities across the state.

…

Hospital advocates argue that the more than $20 million in state funds is essential for providing care for the poor and disabled, since hospitals never fully recoup the cost of treating Medicaid patients.

And hospitals cannot turn away those patients. That, in turn, will force them to recoup the money elsewhere – or cut their budgets.

Find out more at the Inquirer.