“Tucked away on page 466” is a provision that quietly replaces states’ obligation to make sure doctors are paid to deliver services to the poor with a new obligation to make sure the services are in fact delivered. “‘With the expanded definition, it leaves every state vulnerable to a new wave of lawsuits any time someone cannot access a service, even if that service is limited by virtue of the rates we pay,’ said Alan Levine, Louisiana’s secretary of health and hospitals, in a recent memo prepared for fellow state government officials.” [Jon Ward, Daily Caller]
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“States fear that five words in Obama health law will open door to lawsuits”…
“Tucked away on page 466” is a provision that quietly replaces states’ obligation to make sure doctors are paid to deliver services to the poor with a new obligation to make sure the services are in fact delivered. “‘With the……
Is this by error or design? The trial lawyers groups seemed to be in favor of this fustercluck of a bill. I wonder if there are any more legal booby traps in there?
Maybe the intention of this is to be a backdoor way of forcing the states to increase their Medicaid reimbursement rates to physicians, while ensuring that the additional cost doesn’t show up on the federal government’s books.
Unless the federal government conscripts physicians there soon won’t enough of doctors to treat the nation’s Medicaid and Medicare patients.
Which may have been the plan all along.