The idiocy and Tea Party centric nature of SC Governor Nikki Haley’s governance is reflected in a recent decision to expand the range of medical screenings offered to Medicaid patients. You’ll remember that Haley refused to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, this decision left 300,000 low income residents without health care. Instead of accepting federal money to cover the cost of expanding Medicaid, Haley expanded an existing program, SC Healthy Connections Checkup is an expansion of what was called Family Planning coverage. Everyone knows early diagnosis is the key to treating potentially fatal illnesses like cancer so this sounds like a great idea at first.

Starting August 1st Healthy Connections will cover a once every two years physical exam with a wider variety of health screenings, what they won’t cover is treatment. So…if you are diagnosed with cancer or diabetes or heart disease the state agency will refer you to health providers like free clinics or hospitals and doctors that may take you on as a charity case otherwise you’re on the hook for the total cost of treatment, since you don’t have insurance. Sue Berkowitz, director of the SC Appleseed Legal Justice Center said, “Telling someone they have colorectal cancer then they don’t have any services available is devastating.” Dr. Tom Gailey a Greenville ob-gyn is worried about the fallout from this expansion, “We have to admit on the front end we’re going to see a lot of diagnoses of disease. If we don’t realize the breadth, depth and scope of this, everyone is going to be miserable.”

Haley’s minion Tony Keck, the director of the SC Department of Health and Human Services was quoted in the same article in The State as saying that discovering cancer would be a step forward but he also acknowledged the bugaboo, “The trick here isn’t the screening it’s the referrals.” Except it isn’t a “trick” these are people lives we’re talking about.

http://www.thestate.com/2014/07/09/3553930/sc-healthy-connections-checkup.html

I often wonder how Governor Haley and Tony Keck sleep at night knowing that people will die this year because she refused to offer them free health insurance and medical assistance through the expansion of Medicaid at virtually no cost to our state. Instead she chooses to spend $48 million in one year to expand screenings but not treatment. Brilliant.