Public Health Costs

 

In another article we explained the threat of contagious diseases being carried by people entering our country primarily from third world countries.  Legal immigrants and visitors must demonstrate that they are free of communicable diseases and drug addiction to qualify for lawful permanent residence. 

 

Here we must discuss the costs to American health care of the presence of illegal aliens. In reading this, keep in mind that the costs to America and Americans will not diminish if these people are legalized. To the contrary, costs will increase because they will become eligible for public health benefits not now available to them.

 

Not only would the legalization of 10 -12 million illegal aliens plus the family chain migration which will follow (past history indicates another 60 to 70 million), be harmful to our nation’s medical system and the well being of our citizens, but it will impose a tremendous cost burden on the taxpayers. In 2001, when the U.S. had millions fewer illegal immigrants than we do now, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies put the total uncompensated care for uninsured illegal immigrants at between $4.8 and $8.75 billion in unpaid care.  The question is must be asked: Who will pay entitlements for the amnestied, low-income families, including Medicaid for the ill and diseased?

 

On March 13, 2005, the WorldNetDaily.com posted the following story:

 

Cristobal Silverio emigrated illegally from Mexico to Stockton, Calif., in 1997 to work as a fruit picker.  He brought with him his wife, Felipa, and three children, 19, 12 and 8, all illegals.  When Felipa gave birth to her fourth child, daughter Flor, the family had what is referred to as an “anchor baby,” an American citizen by birth who provided the entire Silverio clan a means to qualify for free medical care.

 

But, Flor was born premature, spent three months in the neonatal incubator and cost the San Joaquin Hospital more than $300,000.  Meanwhile, oldest daughter Lourdes, married an illegal alien and gave birth to a daughter, too.  Her name is Esmeralda.  And Felipa had yet another child, Cristian.

 

The two Silverio anchor babies generate $1,000 per month in public welfare funding for the family.  Flor gets $600 a month for asthma.  Healthy Cristian gets $400.  While the Silverios earned $18,000 last year picking fruit, they picked up another $12,000 for their two “anchor babies.”  While President Bush says the U.S. needs more “cheap labor” from south of the border to do jobs Americans aren’t willing to do, the case of the Silverios shows there are indeed uncalculated costs involved in the importation of such labor, public support and uninsured medical costs.

 

 In fact, the increasing number of illegal aliens coming into the United States is forcing the closure of hospitals, spreading previously vanquished diseases and is threatening to destroy America’s prized health-care system, says a report by Dr. Madeleine Pelner Cosman in the spring, 2006, issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. According to her study, 84 California hospitals are closing their doors as a direct result of the rising number of illegal aliens and their non-reimbursed tax on the system.

 

“Anchor babies,” the author writes, “born to illegal aliens instantly qualify as citizens for welfare benefits and have caused enormous rises in Medicaid costs and stipends under Supplemental Security Income and Disability Income.”

 

Another perspective was offered by Monica Rhor in an article she wrote, carried by the Associated Press and the Houston Chronicle on February 22, 2007.  In her article titled “Bill Denying Citizenship to U.S.- Born Babies Would Cost State,” Ms. Rhor reported that a Texas legislator wants to challenge the right to automatic U.S. citizenship for babies born to illegal immigrants.  That would disqualify them from receiving certain state and federal benefits.

 

The bill, sponsored by State Rep. Leo Berman, R-Tyler, would deny birthright citizenship to those children.  But state and local health officials said it could end up putting a heavier financial burden on already overwhelmed public hospitals, increase costs to local taxpayers, and create a population of children who do not receive basic medical care or immunizations.

 

That situation would arise because as U.S. citizens the babies qualify for Medicaid for the first year of their life, or CHIPS coverage. The mothers’ obstetrics costs are covered through a special Medicaid program.  Officials estimate that about three of every four births at public hospitals in Houston, Dallas and Fort Worth are to illegal immigrant mothers, so that is no small thing. 

 

If the infants are denied automatic citizenship, however, thousands would not qualify for those state and federal reimbursement programs.  That would saddle the public hospitals with the extras costs, said King Hillier, Vice President of public policy and government relations with the Harris County Hospital District, which includes Houston.  “They would further exacerbate the problem of the uninsured in the state.”

 

Public hospitals are already grappling with the contradictory problems of carrying out their mandate to treat those in need, while finding a way to pay mounting health care bills.

 

In 2005, Harris County officials estimate, the district treated 57,072 illegal immigrants about 20 percent of all patients.  The total cost for treating illegal immigrants was $128 million, but the hospital district received only $28 million in reimbursements from the federal and state governments.  The patients paid about $3 million.  The hospital district was left with the rest of the bill, some $97 million paid by Harris County taxpayers.

 

Only 8.8 percent of those patients were treated in the emergency room; the rest went to outpatient clinics or community health centers.  Of the patients who were illegal aliens, 84 percent were women; and most were pregnant women receiving prenatal or maternity care.

 

Approximately 8,000 babies were born to illegal aliens in the Harris County Hospital District last year.  At Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas, about 11,000 births were to illegal immigrants.

 

“People without insurance are walking on a tightrope.  When they get sick, it’s like a freefall without a parachute.  We are the safety net that catches them,” said David Lopez, president of the Harris County Hospital District, who says the district will not turn patients away because of immigration status.

 

A federal reimbursement program that began in 2005 distributes $250 million across the nation each year for emergency care for illegal immigrants.  In 2005, Texas got about $47 million.  But the program does not compensate the hospitals for outpatient treatment for chronically ill patients or preventive and prenatal care. Thus, those costs would have to come out of the operating budgets of each hospital. In the case of public hospitals, the costs would be borne by the taxpayer, or services would have to be curtailed.

 

Berman blames illegal immigrants for the financial crisis facing public hospitals, and says his bill would deter those who want to enter the country illegally.

 

An opposing view was offered by Jennifer Ng’andu, a senior health policy analyst with the National Council of La Raza.  She stated, “This goes against the foundation of our country.  We were founded on the fact that we would never create a second class citizenry.  Beyond that, it is making a distinction about which children should have access to care,  Is that really serving the best public interest?”

 

NAFBPO realizes there will be arguments on both sides of this issue.  Nevertheless, it is clear that no matter how you look at it, large numbers of illegal aliens place a heavy burden on our medical and social services.  Legalizing them will not change their economic status; they will still be poor, and they will draw even more heavily on publicly-funded health care services as they become legally eligible for them.  And as sixty to seventy million members of their families arrive over the years the total will run higher and higher.  It will have to be covered by the U.S. taxpayer at a time when Social Security is in crisis.