THE California State Senate on Tuesday, June 2, approved in a 28-11 vote a hotly debated proposal that would expand health care coverage to undocumented immigrants.
The measure, Senate Bill 4, would allow eligible children under the age of 19 to enroll in Medi-Cal. A certain number of undocumented low-income adults would also be allowed to sign up for a separate program offering the same services, should additional funding be appropriated in the state budget. Higher-income individuals would be permitted to purchase unsubsidized insurance through Covered California if the federal government allows them to do so.
“We are talking about our friends, we are talking about our neighbors and our families who are denied basic health care in the richest state of this union,” said Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens), author of the measure. “Ensuring that every child in California grows up healthy and with an opportunity to thrive and succeed is simply the right thing to do.”
Lara, whose parents were formerly undocumented immigrants, said many people spend hours in emergency rooms waiting for treatment.
“Many often forgo medical care because of the fear of medical debt,” he said.
Approval of the bill comes just days after lawmakers significantly scaled it back to help get it past the Senate Appropriations Committee. Originally, it would have offered state-subsidized Medi-Cal to people in the country without authorization, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Most Republicans were opposed to the legislation, including Sen. Jeff Stone (R-Murrieta), who said the bill exacerbates the shortage of doctors to attend to Medi-Cal patients
“This bill would only add hundreds of thousands of patients to the rolls with no one to care from them,” he said.
In the debate on the measure, Sen. Isadore Hall (D-Los Angeles) called on his Republican colleagues to support SB 4, and said their “excuses” not to support it were “tools of the weak and incompetent.”
Two Republican senators, Andy Vidak of Hanford and Anthony Cannella of Ceres, who both represent swing agricultural districts, joined Democrats in voting yes on the measure.
Vidak said, “the taxpayers are already paying high healthcare costs for undocumented when they show up in our emergency rooms.”
SB 4 now heads to the Assembly, where it is expected to encounter a challenging road.
Doreena Wong, health access project director at Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles, called on the Assembly to support the Senate’s investment. She also applauded the state senate for passing the legislation and “understanding the importance of keeping all of California’s kids healthy.”
“As an organization serving Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander (AANHPI) immigrant communities for over 30 years, we have seen the critical need of health care for more than 400,000 estimated undocumented AANHPIs, and we will continue to advocate for their right to have an equal opportunity to lead a healthy life,” Wong said email to the Asian Journal.
Should the bill be implemented, it is estimated to cost up to $740 million each year, though updated figures have not yet been released since the amendments. And because of the high cost, a signature is not guaranteed in the event SB 4 reaches Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk.
Despite the projected cost of the proposed legislation, Maria Segarra, a staff attorney at Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach, told Inquirer.net she believes the cost of emergency healthcare significantly outweighs that of providing medical insurance to undocumented immigrants.
“There are people who are opposed to this bill because of the cost it entails for the coverage. My response is that the cost is minimal compared to the value or ensuring a healthy population,” she told Inquirer.net.
“Even though they’re undocumented, they’re working and paying taxes. Consider how much more they could contribute when their health is managed,” she added. (Agnes Constante/AJPress with reports from Inquirer, Los Angeles Times and The Sacramento Bee)
