Should ERs require ID before administering treatment?

Here is a right-wing view:

I’m of the opinion that it would be immoral to deny someone emergency medical services, regardless of their legal status. However, I don’t believe hospitals should provide long-term care to illegals.
In other words, break your leg and head to the hospital, then you get treated whether you’re legal or illegal. On the other hand, if you’ll need regular long-term treatment and you’re not here legally, you should either have to pay for it or go home. It’s not our job to provide free health care service to the world and I don’t think Americans should have to spend more for health care because some illegal with tuberculosis or AIDS snuck into the United States and can’t pay for his treatment.

Comments

Anonymous
Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, Texas is home to the second busiest maternity ward in the country with almost 16,000 new babies arriving each year. (That’s almost 44 per day — every day)
A recent patient survey indicated that 70 percent of the women who gave birth at Parkland in the first three months of 2006 were illegal immigrants.’ Crikey, that’s 11,200 anchor babies born every year just in Dallas. According to the article, the hospital spent $70.7 million delivering 15,938 babies in 2004 but managed to end up with almost $8 million dollars in surplus funding. Medicaid kicked in $34.5 million, Dallas County taxpayers kicked in $31.3 million and the feds tossed in another $9.5 million.
The average patient in Parkland’s maternity wards is 25 years old, married and giving birth to her second child. She is also an illegal immigrant. By law, pregnant women cannot be denied medical care based on their immigration status or ability to pay. OK, fine. That doesn’t mean they should receive better care than everyday, middle-class American citizens.
But at Parkland Hospital, they do.
Parkland Memorial Hospital has nine prenatal clinics. NINE. The Dallas Morning News article followed a Hispanic woman who was a patient at one of the clinics and pregnant with her third child — her previous two were also born at Parkland. Her first two deliveries were free and the Mexican native was grateful because it would have cost $200 to have them in Mexico. This time, the hospital wants her to pay $10 per visit and $100 for the delivery but she was unsure if she could come up with the money. Not that it matters, the hospital won’t turn her away. (I wonder why they even bother asking at this point.)
How long has this been going on? What are the long-term effects? Well, another subject of the article was born at Parkland in 1986 shortly after her mother entered the U.S. illegally — now she is having her own child there as well. (That’s right, she’s technically a U.S. citizen.) These women receive free prenatal care including medication, nutrition, birthing classes and child care classes. They also get freebies such as car seats, bottles, diapers and formula.
Most of these things are available to American citizens as well but only for low-income applicants and even then, the red tape involved is almost insurmountable.
Because these women are illegal immigrants they do not have to provide any sort of legitimate identification — no proof of income. An American citizen would have to provide a social security number which would reveal their annual income — an illegal immigrant need only claim to be poor and the hospital must take them at their word.
My husband is a pilot for the United States Navy (yes, he fought in Iraq) and while the health care is good, we Navy wives don’t get any of these perks! Car seats? Diapers? Not so much. So my question is this: Does our public medical care system treat illegal immigrants better than American citizens? Yes it does!
As I mentioned, the care I have received is perfectly adequate but it’s bare bones, meat and potato medical care — not top of line.
Their (the illegals) medical care is free — simply because they are illegal immigrants? Once again, there is no way to verify their income. Parkland Hospital offers indigent care to Dallas County earn less than $40,000 per year. (They also have to prove that they did not refuse health coverage at their current job. Yeah, the ‘free’ care is not so easy for Americans.)
There are about 140 patients who received roughly $4 million dollars for un-reimbursed medical care. As it turns out, they did not qualify for free treatment because they resided outside of Dallas County. So the hospital is going to sue them! Illegals get it all free! But U.S. citizens who live outside of Dallas County get sued! How stupid is this?
As if that isn’t annoying enough, the illegal immigrant patients are actually complaining about hospital staff not speaking Spanish. In this AP story, the author speaks with a woman who is upset that she had to translate comments from the hospital staff into Spanish for her husband. The doctor was trying to explain the situation to the family and the mother was forced to translate for her husband who only spoke Spanish. This was apparently a great injustice to her.
In an attempt to create a Spanish-speaking staff, Parkland Hospital is now providing incentives in the form of extra pay for applicants who speak Spanish. Additionally, medical students at the University of Texas Southwestern for which Parkland Hospital is the training facility will now have a Spanish language requirement added to their already jammed-packed curriculum. No other school in the country boasts such a ridiculous multi-semester (multicultural) requirement.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/immigration/parkland.asp
Anonymous
One of the seldom utilized penalties for illegal entry and for hiring of illegals is the punitive fine. Hiring illegals should be subject to heavy fines, and working here illegally should also be fined. The incentive to unlawfully enter this country is a monetary one, the incentive to lure illegals is also a monetary one, the burden to local communities and local institutions is also a monetary one, it only makes sense to reverse the incentive as well. And businesses that hire illegals should be subject to qui tam lawsuits as well. This solution would be a whole lot cheaper than building a stupid fence.
Anonymous
Most of the care we give to illegals in my emergency Room is not”emergency care”. None of them have Primary Care docs (just like 50% of the legals in this country), so they go to the ER for their primary care. Especially when it’s raining out.
Anonymous
Hey guys these illegals contribute $8 billion dollars a year to Social Security that they will not recuperate.
Anonymous
some medical care should be paid for. other care shoudl be just given. free medical care to a poor hispanic seeking maternity care shoudl be free. bill her. but who really cares if she pays or not. bringing a kid into the world is importnat . society shoud support it. we paid over 400 billion for this war in iraq. lets take care of the people who live here.
Anonymous
“ree medical care to a poor hispanic seeking maternity care shoudl be free. bill her. but who really cares if she pays or not. bringing a kid into the world is importnat . society shoud support it. “
Are you aware other countries offer “junkets” to the US so women can deliver their babies in this country? The purpose? Once a baby is born in the US she/he becomes a citizen and gets all benefits. I have nothing against immigration but the system is out of control.
Anonymous
“Hey guys these illegals contribute $8 billion dollars a year to Social Security that they will not recuperate.”
Hey idiot, they cost magnitudes more than that in every other social program including healthcare, food stamps, education system, preschool assistance. Plus if they do file taxes they get the earned income tax credit and get a refund.
Anonymous
Be smart people. The problem does not need to be solved at the medical delivery system level. People aren’t comign here for the country’s superiour healthcare (at least not at massive levels). They come here for employment. By stopping that incentive, we’ve cut the problem in half. HEAVY fines with strict enforcement, major deterant to farmers and illegal employers such as construction and factories. Start there, and the numbers will drop so fast, the country can afford a limited amount of illegal immigrants. And doctor’s would not be in this ethically unsound position. Once again, the system fails US physicians.
Anonymous
First: Get to and fine the source. The problem is unscrupulous anti-American employers exploiting immigrants for their own insatiable greed. Greed like the contractor who picks up several immigrants to lay concrete while he works on procuring further contracts. The same contractor whose employees impregnate other illegals, eventually seeking maternity refuge in tax-paying medical facilities. Is this just anti-immigrant rhetoric? I can speak from experience because I am a legal immigrant (now American) and know three couples who fit this description.
A fence does nothing, complaining about tax payers footing medical bills is just talk without action. The problem will not go away because businesses (construction, agri, housecleaning, etc) and government have too much to gain from undercutting the American middle-class. WAKE UP AMERICANS!!! Why do politicians constantly talk about the need for a fence? Is this even logical? A fence for what?
I have studied this problem since the early 90s and see it worsening steadily. No one seems to understand or care about the long-term effects. It is incredible that so many see the picture when their own wallets are cyclically hit (recession).
Illegal aliens do contribute to the economy in different ways, but the drain on healthcare and other gov’t backed services is significantly higher. And we haven’t weighed in the effects of the needs of anchor children generations from now.
The national unemployment rate is roughly 7% (these are mostly Americans, people) while illegals are working under the radar (not really, they are clearly visible) and heading to MoneyGram to xfer. Meanwhile business owners lower the income rate by using cheap labor and drive medicare costs through the roof (money to cover expenses must come from somewhere). Hospitals are laden with illegal immigrants (or is undocumented or “currently awaiting papers” the correct phrase?) and their demands are unbelievable. Having experienced a stay in the maternity ward (paid with my money), I was in a room with someone who spoke almost no English, demanded special care (I understand Spanish), NEVER thanked the round-the-clock nurses and consultants. Was she illegal? Yes. How do I know? We were in the same room for three days and talked about our lives. She returned to U.S. three weeks prior, husband was hired to install commercial windows, and she wanted to have her son in the U.S. This was her second child (first also born in US). And it goes on and on.
Why do Americans cater?
While my family works and pays for services as EVERYONE should, many get a free pass. Money-grubbing, employers who’d rather exploit cheap labour and destroy the lower and middle classes are the root of this problem. They should have their licenses stripped for starters.
Of course this blog and many others posted by future generations will continue to spread this rant – with little to no action taken by angry Americans. Then again, many people believe the current situation is just.

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