Are you one of the millions “enjoying” ♡bamaCare!!!’s expanded Medicaid coverage? If you are, there’s a good chance you already know why I put “enjoying” in scare quotes. NYT has the details:
“Half of providers [IE, doctors] could not offer appointments to enrollees,” the investigators said in the report, which will be issued on Tuesday.
Many of the doctors were not accepting new Medicaid patients or could not be found at their last known addresses, according to the report from the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services. The study raises questions about access to care for people gaining Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
The health law is fueling rapid growth in Medicaid, with enrollment up by nine million people, or 16 percent, in the last year, the department said.
The government can give you a piece of paper saying you’re entitled to this or to that. It can even cut you a check. What it can’t do is conjure up doctors who aren’t there, or to compel them to treat patients they don’t care to see.
Actually, that last point is true today — but I wonder if a future Democrat Congress won’t find some nifty way to sidestep the 13th Amendment and force doctors to treat people at unsustainable prices.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member