Unhealthy News

Back on August 4, I mentioned there had been an effort to require hospitals to gather personal information about undocumented immigrants seeking treatment at emergency rooms. The hospitals would have to do this and submit the data to the Department for the Security of the Fatherland in order to obtain federal reimbursement for the costs of the treatment. The bill, thankfully, had been trounced in the House.

But, repeating a by now familiar pattern, the WHS* simply shrugged and said "Can't make it a law? Who cares, we'll just do it anyway" - trying to gain by regulation what they could not gain by legislation. From the New York Times for August 10:

The federal government is offering $1 billion to hospitals that provide emergency care to undocumented immigrants. But to get the money, hospitals would have to ask patients about their immigration status, a prospect that alarms hospitals and advocates for immigrants. ...

[F]ederal health officials, under guidelines developed in the last couple of weeks, said hospitals had to ask questions about immigration status to make sure the money would be used as Congress intended, for "emergency health services furnished to undocumented aliens."

Hospital executives and immigrant rights groups said the questioning would deter undocumented immigrants from seeking hospital care when they need it, and some hospitals said compliance might cost them more than they would receive in federal aid.

Not only do the feds want hospitals to ask a series of specific, detailed questions about citizenship and immigration status, they want hospital employees to sign forms stating the information was "true and complete" to the best of their knowledge, with civil and criminal penalties for submitting false information to the government. And get this:

Under the new guidelines, photocopies of passports, visas, border crossing cards or other documents that establish the patient's status should, if available, be included in the patient's file.

The feds say that individual data would not "ordinarily" have to be sent to the government, but hospitals have to keep it on file just in case they want to check. Since this is the same administration that has actively sought to intrude into doctor-patient confidentiality in pursuit of those who objected to its asinine anti-abortion laws, I really doubt that is going to be particularly reassuring to either hospitals or patients.

Footnote, Unintentional Humor Dept.: In reply to concerns that such questioning of status could make undocumented immigrants fearful of seeking medical treatment even for their children (who would of course be citizens if born here),

Dr. Mark B. McClellan, administrator of the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said hospitals could ask the questions in "an unobtrusive way" that would not discourage immigrants from seeking care.

Exactly how do you "unobtrusively" ask someone if they're on a 72-hour immigrant pass and obtain a photocopy of their "passport, visa, border crossing card or other document that establishes" their status?

*WHS = White House Sociopaths