Posted on 05/03/2008 7:07:59 AM PDT by kellynla
It is this reporter’s opinion that, after covering the invasion by illegal aliens over the past 40 years, it is difficult to find a story such as that related by Anna Gorman of the Los Angeles Times concerning illegal alien Ana Puente.
“Ana was an infant with a liver disorder when her aunt brought her illegally to the U.S. to seek medical care,” said Gorman.
The child underwent two liver transplants at UCLA Medical Center as a small child in 1989, and a third in 1998 — all totally paid for by the state of California.
Now it is reported that Puente has turned 21 and is due for another transplant. But she has aged out of her state-funded health insurance and is unable to continue to receive treatment at UCLA.
Her liver is failing again with her clinical course irreversible. Now we learn of a little-known option for a patient with certain healthcare needs such as hers.
Gorman says that if Puente notifies U.S. Citizenship and Immigration services that she is in the country illegally, state health officials may grant her full Medi-Cal coverage.
Puente has done so and has had her benefits restored. She currently awaits a fourth transplant at UCLA.
Puente shrugs this off saying UCLA should take care of her for the rest of her life, “because I’ve been there since I was a baby.”
With examples such as this, is it any wonder America faces financial bankruptcy with hospitals all over the nation closing while hardworking taxpayers pick up the cost?
Should illegals be the recipient of expensive transplant surgery? The tremendous cost of transplant surgery such as a liver transplant amounts to one-half million dollars, with additional post operative medical care, including the cost of anti-rejection medications, costing an estimate $30,000 annually.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
ping
So in other words, 2 legal US citizens were denied liver transplants so that an illegal could get them twice. Wonderful!
Oh, and the aunt ought to be shot.
Cradle to grave mentally.
I may just have to spend my retirement in another state...
Judges make these decisions everyday. If you are illegal your only right is a ride to the nearest border.IMHO
This is near and dear to my heart since I work for a hospital who recently had to "downsize" about 10% of the workforce mostly because we are hemorrhaging money treating illegals. The ER is their primary care physician and they sit there and demand their free care. We are also a trauma center. They are in gangs and shoot each other, slice and dice each other and drive drunk and under the influence of drugs with devastating consequences in terms of the cost of treating their injuries. Of course none of them are insured -- the Mexican drug cartel doesn't offer group coverage. The Mexican consulate refuses to accept responsibility for their care.
Hey, I bet we could afford it if we cut off all the foreign aid we send to their corrupt govts.
That is sarc, by the way. Or half sarc. Actually I am in favor of ending foreign aid and free medical care paid for by the taxpayers.
That is crazy that immigration status is not a factor. We have plenty of legal citizens of lesser means who are in need of transplants. Their health should not be risked simply because an illegal is "more ill." If anything, such illegals should be deported quickly so that they do not burden our healthcare system with their problems.
I do not believe ourselves to be so callous to allow someone to die simply because they are here illegally.
I am and I would. I find it disgusting that legal Americans who cannot buy their way to the front of the transplant list are being booted because some illegal was able to jump the line. As far as I am concerned, should any legal American of lesser means die because an illegal received taxpayer-provided healthcare, then the government that approved that decision has blood on its hands.
If anything, illegals knowing full well that they would not have any access to taxpayer-provided healthcare would serve as another disincentive for them to come here illegally.
Not even God makes such decisions.
Unfortunately, we do not have the power of God. But that doesn't change the fact that the countries from which these people came need to take more responsibility to provide their citizens with access to healthcare, instead of burdening us with the responsibility of dealing with the healthcare needs of the entire planet.
Here's the conundrum here: would you take the decision in denying this girl the transplant?
I would deny the transplant, in a heartbeat, and have the person deported in the next heartbeat. It is a very easy decision for me to make. There are legal citizens who need healthcare. But I do have a heart. If someone was willing to pay the costs of healthcare out of their own pocket, then someone who came here illegally should be considered for a temporary medical visa so that he or she can get the services they need.
Although I understand your compassion, you probably don't understand mine. If it is so noble to save the dying children of the world, then those suffering babes should be airlifted from Africa, South America, Asia and Canada, at your state's expense, and brought to your state's hospitals for proper care before they die.
This is just the ad absurdium extension of the compassion that, while truly humane, disregards the rationale for establishing a culture, community and government that is responsible to CITIZENS, those who have built that social construct for the betterment of its members. Charity, then, becomes the responsiblity of those individual citizens, at whatever measure they individually feel disposed, rather than the government whose first and ONLY responsibility is to its citizenry.
You avoid these kinds of conundrums by making it a policy that illegals are returned to their country without exception.
There are millions of people worldwide who suffer from fatal illnesses—do we provide for all? Or do we treat someone differently because she lives in a country next door and can be smuggled into this country with little effort? If we are concerned with equity among all the people of the world, where is the “fairness” in simple geographic consaguinity?
If there is a moral problem with this, then the answer is to find private charitable funding before the patient arrives for treatment.
Great comment!
Let her go back to Mexico and get her transplant there. She is a citizen of Mexico and is their responsibility. This is a no-brainer. No illegal should receive hospital care at the expense of US citizens.
...damn....and I am trying to scrap together enough money to pay to treat my prostate cancer...just damn...
I'm sure there are many US citizens in life and death situations that are bound by the restrictions of healh insurance and DO end up dying because they cannot come up with the $$$ for their treatment.
Yes, Exactly...the hospital should contact the Mexican Gov to request payment for the procedure. If they refuse, it is their problem.
This is a dilemma, but that is where the rule of law makes it easier. Her own Nation can support her. She should not be here in the first place. If laws were enforced, we wouldn’t be having this discussion....
What they deserve is one free gift from The United States Government consisting of; waiving of prosecution for illegal entry by granting permission for permanent identification by the installation of an earlobe stud containing identifying info, which can only be removed surgically, or a tattoo on a location of their choice and then immediate deportation with the understanding that they can apply for legal immigration, but people with out the ear studs or tattoos are first in line.
That ought to keep the ACLU busy for decades, thus granting the Boy Scouts, Public schools, Christian Churches, etc., relief to tend to their own business as the signers of the Constitution intended.
Sarcasm/off/??
Thank you!
ILLEGALS shouldn’t be here to begin with.
bttt your post
Geaorge Putnam ping
What would McCain do?
Grant her citizenship.
Putnam is a champion on this issue. He began warning about illegal aliens over three decades ago.
Yes.
Great personal compassion shines through your questions. However, because this is not a private service but a government provided service, the answers are not personal. Those answers are the province of the Nation and of the Several States. Those answers must balance our society's moral obligation with its survival.
And those answers must be; that emergency medical treatment is available to all, and that longer-term government provided medical care is a privilege afforded only to citizens. These answers properly balance our society's compassion with its survival.
Remember, all resources and capacity are limited. There is no magic medical exception. Using these resources and capacity costs money. Normally people pay for it (which replenishes resources and capacity). They can do so because they have generated wealth. But some cannot pay. They do not have wealth. If government steps in and pays for them, it does so with treasure. Treasure is not wealth. Government does not generate wealth. When government expends treasure it reduces the resources of the country (society). It replenishes nothing.
That is why we keep government out of health care as much as possible. But we as society acknowledge a moral obligation to all who cannot pay for emergency medical treatment and to citizens who cannot pay for all medical treatment. That moral obligation is fulfilled through limited government intervention.
Remember, the purpose of emergency medical treatment is to remove the patient from immediate danger. It is a moral obligation for short-term care. Government provided emergency treatment of an illegal alien should be followed by immediate deportation or appropriate court action. All other government provided medical treatment to those who cannot pay is a privilege of citizens and is subject to rationing, which is a life and death decision.
Understand, government and the health care community make life and death decisions every day. This becomes mortally evident during pandemics. Then medical resources and capacity are exceeded. The health care focus shifts to saving society, not individuals. People will die based on decisions made to preserve society. That is how government legitimately functions.
And that is how it must function for people in this country illegally. Illegal aliens must never have privileges greater or even equal to that or our citizens. They must never be allowed to benefit from their crime of being in this country illegally. We afford illegal aliens emergency medical care as moral obligation. But anything more is a threat to our society and should be rejected by all our government levels.
So yes, we make the decision that our citizens are more important than illegal aliens. And we do it through laws crafted to balance moral obligations with survival. That is how a mature society remains a society. That is the price of nationhood.
The more we give, the more they feel entitled to take.
“Of course none of them are insured — the Mexican drug cartel doesn’t offer group coverage”
If this wasn’t so sad, your comment would be funny!
One Reporter’s Opinion — Illegals Do Not Deserve Free Healthcare....
this ain’t just one reporter’s opinion...it is the opinion of over half the population of the US citizenry...just not that of jorge bush/juan mccain or any other lib/dem!!!!
“Here’s to a better, stronger America.”
Ping!
The only benefit an illegal should get, is enough medical care, in an emergency, to return them to a hospital across the border.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
While you all think that it is easy to tell someone that there is nothing they can do for them medically and that they are going to die, in reality, in the medical world, it’s a hard thing to do. The woman is here already, I am sure there is a way to have funds raised privately to assure she will not die.
“The only benefit an illegal should get, is enough medical care, in an emergency, to return them to a hospital across the border.”
BINGO!
We have a winner!
So what? Is it OK to let a legal resident of the USA of lesser means go without a transplant so some illegal can get one on our dime?
Organ transplants are not like giving away candy. By granting one to an illegal and having the taxpayer pay for it, you are taking an organ that could be used to save the life of a legal resident.
Mexico itself would have no trouble excluding a possible recipient because of their (illegal) immigrant status.
Putnam was out in front of this issue when Bush was getting drunk in college.
He warned everyone what was coming 30 years ago...Few outside of California listened.
An outrage----a person declaring they are illegal should mean a bus trip back from whence they came. Let their own countries take care of them.
There are two problems which, together, make that policy impossible to implement:
1) No one is prepared to define "emergency", because,
2) No one will defend a doctor or nurse who says something is NOT an emergency, and is later shown to be wrong.
these clowns showing up with any medical condition that is NOT life threatening, NOT an emergency and expecting treatment is absolutely ridiculous; and is running hospitals into the ground...
And faced with closures, you can bet the house that if given that choice; hospitals will do start refusing emergency care to non-emergency patients ...the problem is that the existing laws DEMAND that EVERYONE who shows up be treated...which is ridiculous and the reason that hundreds of hospitals have closed throughout America! The federal laws need to be changed!
“Putnam was out in front of this issue when Bush was getting drunk in college.
He warned everyone what was coming 30 years ago...Few outside of California listened.”
Correctomundo!
Well, we’re paying for the failure in spades!
I always preferred Plato’s Republic. Your arguments are definitely not making me change my mind.
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