Editorial, Opinion Pieces Address Health Care Issues Related to Hurricane Katrina
Three publications recently included an editorial and two opinion pieces on health care issues related to Hurricane Katrina. Summaries appear below.
Editorial
- Economist: The "direct effects" that the hurricane will have on Medicaid "will be severe," but the long-term impact might "be indirect: It seems to have ruined everyone's appetite for serious reform," an Economist editorial states. According to the editorial, "This is a shame because the program has big flaws," such as "perverse incentives" that leave "many trapped in poverty they might otherwise have escaped." Although "no one is suggesting axing Medicaid, ... some say it could be reshaped as thoroughly as welfare was in the 1990s" (Economist, 9/24).
Opinion Pieces
- Nicholas Kristof, New York Times: Although "we need to think about how to rebuild New Orleans, ... we also need to reconstruct a sensible health care system," Kristof, a Times columnist, writes in an opinion piece. "Nearly every medical worker I spoke to warned that there would be a surge in deaths from heart disease, strokes and other ailments, concentrated among the poor, because of the interruption in medicines" after the hurricane, Kristof writes. However, the "reality is that our medical system failed this region long before Katrina arrived," he writes, adding, "So let's rebuild the levees, but let's also construct a health care system that works" (Kristof, New York Times, 9/25).
- David Broder, Washington Post: A Bush administration proposal for states to negotiate waivers that would exempt hurricane evacuees from Medicaid eligibility requirements is a "slower, more cumbersome approach" than a Senate bill that would make all evacuees temporarily eligible for Medicaid, Broder, a syndicated columnist, writes in a Post opinion piece. According to Broder, Bush "is saying all the right things about the problems of poverty highlighted by the plight of Hurricane Katrina victims," but "his administration is dragging its feet on practical steps to help meet their needs" (Broder, Washington Post, 9/22).
