Lawmakers await word on special ‘Medicaid’ session
Rep. Chuck Young of Meridian, a Democrat, has a different view on the issue. He wonders why Mississippi Republicans aren’t on board with Republicans in other states.
“All of the major Republican states, including the great state of New Jersey, they have already accepted Medicaid expansion — also Florida, Ohio,” Young said. “You’ve got about 12 Republican governors who have already approved the program.”
Young said the governor is right to want to bring additional doctors to the state, but he wonders how that can happen if there are fewer health care dollars coming in.
“The governor wants to add 1,000 new doctors in Mississippi,” Young said.
“Each doctor would have a $2 million impact on the economy. What better way for these 1,000 new doctors to go to work than to have 300,000 to 400,000 new guaranteed paying customers?”
Young said that in rejecting the Medicaid expansion, the state is rejecting $13 million in federal funds.
“It’s going to create 10,000 new jobs in Mississippi,” Young said. “With the governor wanting to create these new medical zones, it would just make sense to me to go ahead with the expansion.”
Young said the state needs to cooperate with the federal government on this.
“We are trying to pick and choose which federal guidelines we want to take and which ones we don’t want to take,” Young said, suggesting that Republican lawmakers learn from the state’s history. “We’re borderline to civil unrest. We are very close to civil unrest.”
Meridian Star
4/14/13
hattip – MSPEP
