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AARP

March 1, 2010

California Golden State, Once a Health Care Innovator, Now Slashes Medi-Cal
Crumbling health care

Virginia Villavert, left, takes her mother, Beatriz Alfonso, to an adult day care center several times a week. California’s budget crisis could force the center to close. Photo by Jonathan Sprague/Redux By Jane E. Allen

“We are the ghost of Christmas future for the rest of the country,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access in Sacramento, which advocates affordable health care for all Californians. In 10 years, if significant national reform hasn’t occurred, he said, “the rest of the country will look like where California is now—a much greater uninsured population, a crumbling safety net of public programs and providers, and people more concerned that their coverage is not going to be there for them when they need it.”

Advocates for children, the disabled and older people—including Disability Rights California and AARP Foundation Litigation—won reprieves from legislators and the courts in 2009 to temporarily avert some of the most draconian cuts.

Schwarzenegger insists he needs the flexibility to cut Medi-Cal payments to health providers, limit benefits and raise copays. In a letter to the state’s congressional delegation, he warned that national health care reform could cost California an additional $3 billion to $4 billion annually and urged Congress to modify Medicaid rules so California can “live within limited resources.”

A federal judge last year prevented the state from capping the number of days each week when disabled and low-income adults could get care through the California Adult Day Health Care program. Last month she blocked proposed eligibility criteria that would have cut thousands of people from the program. But it still could be targeted later this year for elimination, said Lydia Missaelides, executive director for the California Association for Adult Day Services. “It’s going to hit a significant number of frail elderly. They will be left on their own.”

Jane E. Allen is a Los Angeles-based freelance reporter.