In comments here and there, I keep reading the claim that people are being denied, in particular, life saving treatments. Actually, hospitals that accept federal funds under a number of programs that include Medicare and Medicaid are required as a matter of federal law to provide treatment to anyone presenting even potential life-threatening, limb-threatening, or organ-threatening symptoms, without regard to ability to pay or regard to citizenship. The law is called the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, was passed in 1986, and remains in force. I might add that the act applies to ambulance services as well.
Given the perilous state of the public option and the health care reform bills in general. I would expect to see a stream of horror stories promoted in media by allies of various reform proposals detailing deaths due to treatment denial thus arguing for the absolute need for a public option. I mean, there are numerous examples, aren’t there?
