I’ve seen letters from doctors advocating Medicaid expansion. They must have already forgotten the massive hospital debt that Gov. LePage only just recently paid off after years of fiscal mismanagement at the hands of liberal politicians in our state.

Medicaid provider reimbursement levels have doctors and hospitals operating at a loss. And, as it turns out, if Maine doesn’t pitch in to pay for Obamacare’s welfare expansion, most of the people in question will be covered for about $4 to $10 per week on the exchange anyway.

Those private plans pay the full amount for services rendered. Sounds like a healthier option for medical professionals.

Besides, 3,100 severely disabled Mainers languish on waiting lists for Medicaid services because politicians keep expanding coverage to able-bodied adults.

That’s a disgrace. Medicaid was designed for the elderly, disabled and children. Not 19- to 64-year-old nondisabled adults, 60 percent of whom are under 45, 60 percent are male, 75 percent are single and 42 percent smoke.

Maine’s neediest will never get off the waiting list if we keep shoveling money into welfare for able-bodied adults. Not to mention the budget squeeze that runaway medical welfare spending is creating, cutting revenue sharing to towns, resulting in sales tax hikes and even leading politicians to raid oil spill cleanup funds.

Maine’s doctors and hospitals should be able to see better than anyone that there are alternatives to Obamacare’s welfare expansion.

Bryan Dench 

 

Falmouth