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Children's Defense Fund Founder: McCain Will Leave Millions Of Children Uninsured
Over nine million children lack health insurance, a trend that shows no sign of slowing down. The consequences can be grievous. Twelve-year-old Deamonte Diver died when an infection from his abscessed tooth spread to his brain; he had no insurance and his mother could not afford $80 to have the tooth pulled. Devante Johnson, age 14, died when his health insurance lapsed -- due to a bureaucratic snafu -- right in the middle of his treatment for kidney disease.
Children should not be falling through the cracks like this. In 1997 Sen. Ted Kennedy (D), Sen. Orrin Hatch (R), and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton spearheaded S-CHIP, a joint federal-state effort to subsidize health coverage for over six million children whose parents earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to afford private coverage.
Why, then, are so many children still without health care? In 2007 Congress voted to expand S-CHIP to include another 3.5 million children, but the bill was vetoed by President Bush, who sneaked behind closed doors to cast his veto without media coverage. Sen. Harry Reed (D) called this decision "heartless."
The candidates are divided on the issue of how to expand health care for children. For example, Barack Obama supported expansion of S-CHIP; John McCain opposed it. S-CHIP will come up again for reauthorization in early 2009.
To learn more about what's at stake in this arena, OffTheBus spoke with Marian Wright Edelman, founder of the Children's Defense Fund, the nation's strongest voice for children and families. In 2000 she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, and the Robert F. Kennedy Lifetime Achievement Award. She is a board member of the Robin Hood Foundation, and is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
Is the U.S. experiencing a children's healthcare crisis?
Marian Wright Edelman: I call it a crisis. One out of every nine children have no health care at all. The effect is devastating. Too many infants are born at low birth weight and die in their first year of life. Uninsured children often go two years without seeing a doctor, even for basic health screenings. And when they go to an emergency room, uninsured children are twice as likely as insured children to die in the hospital.
Is the number of uninsured children increasing?
Actually it decreased last year -- from 9.4 million to 8.9 million -- but it was not because more children were covered by private health insurance. Far from it. Private coverage for children continues to erode, and I expect the number to drop again next year as more parents lose their jobs and health insurance due to the economic downturn. The only reason the number of uninsured children wasn't higher last year was because more children enrolled in two critical safety net programs -- Medicaid and S-CHIP.
What is your perspective on the S-CHIP program?
I'm president of the Children's Defense Fund, an original proponent of S-CHIP. Sadly, today nearly nine million children remain uninsured. We must seize this opportunity -- this election -- to make sure all of the candidates understand that coverage for all children is something the American people want. Children can't wait.
What are the long-term implications for children without health care?
All children need health coverage now. Their growing bodies, developing brains, and emotional health are the building blocks of their adult capabilities and our nation's future. Children with unmet health care needs have immeasurably lower educational outcomes, and as adults their earning power is lower on average. A child without health care is starting life at a serious disadvantage.
What does it mean to be under-insured?
Underinsured children have health coverage but not full benefits. For example, mental health, vision and dental services are often excluded, with heartbreaking consequences. That's what happened to Deamonte Diver, who died because he couldn't afford to have his infected tooth removed.
What is your perspective on coverage for the children of immigrants?
A child is a child is a child. I believe all children, regardless of immigration status, should receive health care. Immigration status is not a factor when it comes to public education, why should it be a factor in access to health care? The way it stands now, the Federal government allows S-CHIP dollars to cover legal immigrants that have been in the U.S. for five or more years.
President Bush says expansion of S-CHIP would entice parents to move from private to government coverage at taxpayer expense. Is there any evidence to support this concern?
That didn't happen when Congress voted to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare for seniors. Seventy percent of those people already had private coverage for prescription drugs, and they kept it.
What do you think of John McCain's plan to expand children's health care?
Senator McCain has no specific health care plan for children. In 2007 he voted against legislation that would have improved and expanded S-CHIP to cover an additional 3.5 million children. At the Children's Defense Fund, we keep a Congressional scorecard. Senator McCain received the lowest score of anyone in the Senate in 2007.
What do you think of Barack Obama's plan to expand children's health care?
Senator Obama's health care reform plan calls for a "mandate" to cover all children and young adults under age 25. Recognizing that children are a special population with specific and immediate health care needs is the right way to go. Preventive care costs a fraction of emergency room care: $100 to treat an asthma attack at a doctor's office; $7,300 when emergency room care is the only option.
Realistically, is there any money left for children, after the Iraq War and the Wall Street bailout?
As we prepare to spend billions of taxpayer dollars to rescue Wall Street from its own excesses, it is unthinkable to me that we would quibble about the cost to care for children -- a mere fraction of the cost of the bailout. To insure nine million children would cost taxpayers less than $1 per week. We can't put the Wall Street bailout on our children's backs. This November, we must hold our elected officials accountable for the policy choices that led us to this place.
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Polls show that health care coverage for all children is something nearly everyone wants. Almost universally considered the decent thing to do, it is also a smart investment. In Florida when parents were helped to buy coverage, emergency room visits dropped by 70 percent, saving the taxpayers $13 million. Few policies are more clearly aligned with American values. Still, Republicans have managed to turn this issue into a political football.
John McCain believes more vigorous competition among private insurers will go a long way toward solving many of the problems plaguing health care today. He says freeing the market from regulation will drive down costs. For an overview of the McCain-Palin health care plan, click here.
Barack Obama believes enlightened regulation and government intervention will help make affordable health insurance available to all Americans. He would begin by mandating coverage for children. For an overview of the Obama-Biden plan, click here.
The Kaiser Public Opinion Spotlight on health care and elections examined public opinion data and historical trends to give some insight into the potential role health care will play in this election. To download the Spotlight, click here.
CBS News reports that one in four children have no full time coverage, a gap twice as big as anyone thought. Eight in 10 Americans favor expanding S-CHIP, which also has the support of private insurance companies, organized labor, the pharmaceutical industry, and hundreds of leading health and children's advocacy groups. This popular children's health insurance program is designed to give low-income working families access to regular check-ups, hospitalization, and vision/hearing screenings. To find out if your children are eligible call toll free 1 (877) KIDS-NOW.
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Candidates' Voting Record On Issues Related To Children's Health Care
-- State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) Reauth. (8/2007): McCain - No; Obama - Yes
-- Teen Pregnancy Education Amendment (2006): McCain - No; Obama - Yes
-- Hurricane Health Care Amendment, to provide emergency health care for survivors of Katrina (2005): McCain - No; Obama - Yes
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" can you put some mustard on this before i eat it"
Scary- but there won't be much money left- repubs are bad at education, bad at special needs- maybe the repubs will fund more hockey rinks around the country
When we have the money to bail out Wall Streeters who knew better, but not helpless children who have the nerve to need medical attention, our priorities are seriously out of whack. I have more of a problem with my tax dollars paying for someone's stupid, preventable, financial thievery than supporting health insurance for people who need it. A country needs to take care of its citizens...ALL of its citizens, not just the wealthy or well-connected ones. Again, McCain shows his cluelessness. Market-based insurance won't help anyone except the insurers. I guess he doesn't care, though. He's covered...by US. Also, someone should let him know that people's health shouldn't be a business.
Wow- some people really are just completely self centered. I wonder how they would feel if something happened to THEM that left their precious children uncared for. Frankly, I don't care if my tax money is supporting basic health care for legal or illegal children- they are just children and they deserve basic care. I believe in personal responsibility, but I also know that things happen. Sometimes people cannot care for their own children, even if they want to. But the children themselves should not suffer for it.
Somehow we found $700 billion dollars sitting around to bail out Wall Street with. Providing children with basic health care will cost far less than that- and will SAVE us money in future health care costs from adults. But really, it is just a matter of common decency. What kind of selfish jerk says " I'll take care of my kid, the **ll with everyone else?"
Oh wait- McCain pretty much said that when he voted against these measures. Disgusting and short-sighted.
This is why I don't want the Democrats in full power.... They tend to want to give away the bank (our tax money) to unnessary causes ..... We never should put other causes before our own survival.......
Would you take care of your family first - or other people first?
THEY ARE CHILDREN.
They have NO control as to their parents' nationality and/or income bracket.
So they should just suffer and die because their parents can't afford health care coverage for them?
democrats want to give tax payers' money away? look what bush is advocating. he wants to give wall street $700 billiion which will probably end up costing us over $1 trillion. you repubs are so out of touch.
The S-CHIP program increase was a Democrat give-away to illegal immigrants...... why should it be approved........I don't want my taxes going to this cause. In the end the S-CHIP program budget was increased by the GOP.
All the proof you need to keep the government out of the health care business. Please see Freddie Mac and Fannie mae. end of story!
In all fairness, I would want to ask McCain why he didn't vote for more funding for this program. I have heard that the S-CHIP progam the Dems were trying to pass - gave too much money to children of illegal immigrants who were not born here in America. And if that is true I agree with McCain. Our country cannot and should not have to pay the way for people other than American citizens. If we continue to give our tax payer monies in this fashion we will be in trouble; and we already are in monetary crisis today because the Dems insisted on giving home loans to people who couldn't afford them !!! I have to agree that McCain was correct in his decision and only trying to protect the American tax payer. . . . .
If you see the unbridled greed of wallstreet and what has happened to our economy...someone needs to look at insurance companies and pharmaceuticals.....the same exact greed mentality is running their corporations. They have no oversite and are quietly raising prices and denying claims.They deny, delay or cheat all in the name of profit...and their profit margins are huge...right behind oil executives.....all at the expense of people. Hurricane Mccain will only add to this situation, force more people to pay taxes for almost non existant coverage from their employer or increase the amount that have none at all because they cannot afford it . All the while the free market in insurance and big pharma will continue to plunder and rape and leave taxpayers to fit the bill....this is the next sunami that has already started......Remember mccains own words...I am a free marketeer....deregulation is good......and we are seeing the results of this disastrous philosophy today......
How many of the 9 million are illegal aliens? Let them petition their own government (Mexico) for health care. I'm certainly not going to pay for them.
How many of the 9 million have parents who don't work? Go to work, get a job, you will have health care. Even if you are on welfare, you still get free health care from the government. What is everyone talking about uninsured people? No hospital can refuse you just because you don't belong to a group health insurance company.
In this country ,the most powerful ,the wealthiest country in the world ,NO CHILD should be with out health care.Children should not be punished for the crimes of their parents if those parents are illegals .NO child should be punished for the poverty of their parents ,NO child should be punished by the system that encourages poverty .And there have been hospitals that have refused people medical care ,it's called IGNORE the people waiting in an emergency room long enough and they 'go away' .MILLIONS of Middle Class WORKING families can not afford health care period ! If you know of a health care provider that can insure a family of say five that lives on LESS than 40 thousand a year and the premiums are affordable ,post the information HERE ,there are MILLIONS who would love to have that information.Please if YOU want people to have insurance POST THE INSURANCE COMPANYS NAME /WEBPAGE/TELEPHONE NUMBERS ,and then you can stop whineing and enjoy this fantasy wonderfully strong economy that McCain thinks is fundementaly strong !!! BTW nothing is free ,theres a price that poor people pay when they are forced by the system into staying poor ,it's their PRIDE .
wow your comments are incredibly narrow-minded and insensitive. my father was murdered at our family business that we had owned for only 3 weeks so my mother was forced to work two jobs to support both me and my brother after we lost everything. yet, my mother still could not afford health insurance for either of us. we were 6 and 4 at the time so that is a long time to go without health insurance. the first time i got any form of health insurance was when i went to college and that was because we were forced to, at a minimum, have the coverage offered by the university. and before you say anything about why i was able to afford to go to college if my mother could not afford health insurance for our family, it was because i received scholarships and grants that covered the entire cost of my education. and my family and i are legal citizens of this country.
What you fail to realize is that working americans cannot afford to buy insurance...and more and more insurance arent paying the bills...so we have a vast majority who are underinsured....but in the meantime CEO's and insurance and big pharma have profits almost as high as oil. We can do better, we are all paying for a national health care...but we are not getting it....
do you realize the government is the largest purchaser of health care?
Some one tell me why mccain has not opted out of his taxpayer funded health care? You know the one that is sooooo bad for you and me.... He can afford any plan in the world....so I am having difficulty understanding why his plan is so bad for you and me....when he still uses it.....
Where do we live? In India?
I am sick of seeing my friends die of cancer because they have no money. I think children, women and men who are citizens of the USA should have the healthcare they need 24/7 -- without compromise -- this is ridiculous for all the tax money we pay -- if adopting socialized medicine is what it takes then whatever it takes -- children in the USA whether citizens or not should be protected and cared for properly. ALL of our citizens should have quality health care.
For pete's sake.....All of a sudden all these children won't have health insurance..!!!
How many have there been in the past and I didn't hear you complaining about it then.
Just because an election is coming up, somebody has started counting.
The way I understand it .... there are a lot of children in this country who are being cared for healthwise.
Try medicade....St. Jude...Shriners....County Hospitals and many other places.
Don't just pick out a few and try to make an issue.
We all have health and insurance problems....Are you pushing for socialized medicine ????
What's wrong with socialized medicine? It works very well with Medicare and the VA. Are you planning on renouncing your Medicare benefits when you are 65?
Try standing in line for 2 or 3 days to see a doctor and then find out that line was just to make an appointment.
Gov't needs to sort out the people who really need help and not hinder the people who have plans thru their employers.
That is what will happen. If you have a good plan, you will lose it with Soc. medicine.
We don't have all the details on these Ins. plans from either party so don't think that
one is better than the other yet.
Why not push for socialized medical care ,we are on the verge of having socialized Goverment owned Business's.County hospitals are closeing their doors on a regular basis now and have been since the late 80's : http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9B0DEEDA1430F935A35754C0A961948260 ,read :http://michael-healthcarematters.blogspot.com/2008/04/closings-mergers-and-new-services.html .BTW we ALL should not have health care or insurance problems in THIS country !This country IS FUNDED by the people and should take care of the people ! Even poor pay taxes ,illegals pay taxes ,as thousands own homes/property ,ect. Read :http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED467475&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED467475
Shame shame on you ,because you are using a childish version of Palins 'handle' berrycooda,so right there is the explaination of why you are greedy and worried only about yourself . ,sad ,very sad .Thought Sarah 'berracuda ' was a childrens advocate ?
palin has never been an advocate of anything that is for the good of the people. she was charging women who were raped for their medical exams following their rape-now that is a damn shame.
Excellent post! My only "complaint" is that it doesn't fully capture the extremity of McCain's position in voting against kids' health coverage. Lots of Republican Senators (18, to be exact) rose to the occasion on this one and voted for the SCHIP bill, putting children ahead of partisan politics. In fact, the bill was designed by a bi-partisan team that included two prominent Republicans (Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah)). Nevertheless, McCain sided with President Bush on this one rather than with the kids of America.
The voting record is at http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&session=1&vote=00307.
How about McCain is voting for the taxpayers that put him in office? Take a poll. Most Americans don't want to pay out more taxes for the lazy to get something for free.
pay out more taxes for the lazy? wow, how about not paying for that war in iraq that will probably end up costing $3 trillion? we could have funded health care for everyone many times over.
Health care for Children should be a priority for ALL Politicans but it isn't .http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED467475&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED467475
I'm hoping the economic meltdown will finally give McCain a clue that privatizing something that benefits poor people is a rotten idea. I'm tired of giving profits to these "let them eat cake" people. Of course, McCain won't ever have to worry about it. He and his family will never need it so they don't care who it leaves out. Bush didn't care about poor children so why would McCain. Perhaps if they ever live in the real world with the rest of us, they can live the consequences of their heartless and soulless policies. They, especially Bush, who've never really had to do anything. Let's just keep penalizing people for being poor. Let's keep giving to those who don't need. Hell, maybe if we wait long enough, we can roll back to Dickensian London.
If those who earn $500.000 and more per year -- and they are the main beneficiaries of Bush policies - pay more in taxes for the next few years, say 10%, there will be no need in bailout. The bailout is an open thievery, a financial burden on our children and grandchildren.
Just adding a retroactive taxation of people who paid no taxes for their offshore business could perhaps give the US a surplus. The Golden Parachutes of Wall Street were made on the deregulations brought on our heads by Gramm and such in 1999. The parachutes must be suspended till the investigation of Wall Street is completed.
It is hard to imagine that anybody still has a faith in Paulson and the small hiding Decider.
Its ironic that of all the debt we're willing to saddle our children with, none of that debt is to help pay for their healthcare.
- Pahbi
So true!!
I feel sorry for that baby!!!
OBAMA08
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