[lbo-talk] Dean Baker on immigration

Marta Russell ap888 at lafn.org
Wed Apr 19 15:31:59 PDT 2006


On Apr 19, 2006, at 2:17 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:


> Marta Russell wrote:
>
>
>>
>
> The most recent data for California health expenditures <http://
> www.cms.hhs.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/downloads/
> nhestatehealthaccountstables.pdf> was $126 billion in 2000. If
> that's increased in line with national expenditures, that was
> probably about $170 billion in 2004. So, $1.4 billion is 0.8% of
> the total. Big damn deal, eh?

Nonchalance is left to the health care-privileged. It is a big damn deal when there aren't funds to continue services that MediCal used to cover. And what would over one billion dollars cover in terms of health care services? I think quite a bit. But since you aren't affected by those changes in Medicaid, what the hell huh?


>
>
>> Noted medical lawyer Madeleine Cosman, J.D., Ph.D., wrote in her
>> online journal on August 27, 2005, "Promoters of open borders and
>> elevating the status of Illegal Aliens brilliantly use Americans'
>> medical compassion against ourselves."
>>
>
> That's pretty funny. Are 46 million uninsured a result of all that
> compassion too?

Yes that was a pretty ridiculous remark.
>
>
>> The medical literature reports that many undocumented immigrants
>> sequester within their bodies infectious and fatal diseases that
>> long ago were fought and eliminated by American medicine Now
>> illegals may carry drug-resistant strains of tuberculosis,
>> malaria, polio, leprosy, plague, dengue fever and Chagas disease.
>>
>
> Oooh, walking toxin containers they are. Who needs suicide bombers
> when we have biological warfare delivery systems on legs?

Again the healthy can laugh if they have such perverse humor but people whose immune systems are compromised such as chronically ill, frail and elderly people are susceptible to these diseases.

Drug-Resistant TB Continues in California http://www.webmd.com/content/Article/107/108408.htm

When undocumented workers come across any border without going through the system there aren't ways to properly test and treat them.

The purpose of health guidelines is to provide persons responsible for infection control and employee health with sufficient information with which to: (1) design and implement a program for screening residents and employees for tuberculosis; (2) reduce transmission through the prompt detection and management of active tuberculosis disease; (3) request consultation from the local health department, and (4) comply with state and federal regulations.

What disappoints me and makes me sad about your reactions is that under any other set of circumstances you would bring up such points. We have controlled these diseases through methods adopted by the Centers for Disease Control. You can't control them when people aren't in the system to get tested.

You didn't comment on what the docs suggested as a means to solve some problems. They suggested:

"Withhold foreign aid to the country of origin in the amount spent providing uncompensated medical care and refund these moneys to providers that granted services.

Require graduates of U.S. medical schools who are citizens of foreign countries to spend community service time treating illegal immigrant patients in the U.S. as contribution in kind to defray expenses billable to that country of origin.

Provide transportation to cities in country of origin where that country is able to provide medical care."

Marta

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