Texas Healthcare is officially going to crap.

[w8liftinglady]

I am so ashamed of my state.Under the leadership of Rick Perry,this is how we help our fellow citizens.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/yahoolatestnews/stories/100610dnmetaidsdrugs.29f56d8.html

Budget cuts imperil Texas HIV drug program




AUSTIN – Unless lawmakers dig deep, Texas may pull back a lifeline that keeps about 15,000 people alive.

The Texas HIV Medication Program, which supplies life-sustaining anti-retroviral drugs to people with HIV or AIDS who can't afford them, will run out of money in the next two years and be forced to cut off enrollment, tighten eligibility or stop covering some drugs unless the state provides an additional $23 million, officials said.

Acclaimed addiction program may be cut
Enrollment has surged to record levels because the recession stripped people of jobs and private health coverage, the state screens more people for HIV, and the drugs are highly successful at prolonging lives, said program manager Dwayne Haught of the Department of State Health Services.


http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/politics/state/stories/DN-medicaid_11tex.ART0.State.Edition1.29c062b.html

Texas doctors threaten to drop Medicaid out of fear of more fee cuts



AUSTIN – Doctors in the Dallas area and across Texas are threatening to opt out of Medicaid because of payment cuts, which would further damage the state's already uneven delivery of health care to the poor.
Carrollton obstetrician Lou Montanaro says says Texas' low provider fees have already forced him to limit the type of Medicaid patients he takes. The 1 percent trim to provider fees that starts Sept. 1 sounds modest. But doctors, insurance industry officials and health care experts widely see it as the first of many hits coming to doctors' wallets as Texas' fiscal woes deepen.


http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/texassouthwest/stories/080910dnmetinmateaddicts.2b1a4af.html

Acclaimed addiction program for Texas felons is vulnerable to cuts


AUSTIN – A nationally acclaimed program that has helped even the hardest-core addicts to sober up and stop committing crimes is vulnerable to state budget cuts.

A staggering 70 percent of the 72,000 offenders freed from Texas Department of Criminal Justice lockups last year were chemically dependent. And without treatment, they're potentially a menace – to property and, in some instances, lives.


Many criminologists and others in the field say that groundbreaking work on drug and alcohol counseling and community supervision has proved so effective that it has prevented another Texas prison-building boom. But they fear that could change if lawmakers cut diversion programs as they tackle a projected $18 billion budget shortfall.

[unhappycamper]

1. $23 mill is what one General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper with 2 $160K Hellfire missles cost.

Methinks bighair has his priorities wrong.

[OHdem10]

2. Conservative Economic Fundamentalism--the first and largest

cuts are in Social Programs. Check out states which have
been "Red" or GOP States and you find the highest rates of
poverty, they rank way down in the 40s in Education, poorest
Health Care. If you want to know what the US will be like
under Republican Rule check out Red States that have been under
GOP Rule for some time. GWB was well on the way to making
the US look like Texas. Big Advantages for Business and
not so good quality of life standards for citizens.

[Dappleganger]

3. Medicare really does need to be fixed, however.

While I don't agree at all with doctors cutting off those patients, the system really needs a major overhaul and strengthening.

[w8liftinglady]

5. i agree.i feel a fair universal healthcare program would be the best

there IS a cost to running an office,paying staff.universal healthcare-with adequate subsidies-would absorb those costs,plus the extra insanity of bantering with insurance companies.

[Dappleganger]

7. Exactly! nt

[Baalath]

8. Medicaid

My family is elderly and lives in San Antonio. The can barely find a doctor who even takes Medicare. This article is about Medicaid, though.

[w8liftinglady]

9. that's a good point.there are more and more Texans who have no access.

[w8liftinglady]

10. if you combine medicare,medicaid and no insurance-it is 50% of our population here

[AldebTX]

4. I heard a Statistic

That per capita, the budget shortfall in Texas is worse then California. Yet in Tea Party circles Texas is held up as a way to run government. Minimal invasive (it's not) and low taxes (they hide them better)

[w8liftinglady]

6. and the Tea party is RAMPANT in my county(just south of Dallas)

yet-they are totally for Medicare(since many of them are already receiving it)...and they bitch when the streets don't get fixed,when the infrastructure is going to crap.