September 24, 2007

Well, Congressional negotiators agreed last Friday on a compromise proposal to reauthorize SCHIP, and---surprise, surprise---"compromise" inside the Beltway means adding Christmas Tree ornaments to a bill already bloated and representing yet another long stride toward a system of medical Schocialism. So here are the goodies, which somehow have been lost in the public discussion over ensuring that The Children get needed health care, as if children in the U.S. go without. The compromise:

1. Requires that all kids in the program get dental benefits as well as "mental health services on par with medical and surgical benefits."
2. Allows states to enroll pregnant women in SCHIP.
3. Revises the CMS regulations requiring that most poor kids be enrolled in SCHIP first, before states can extend participation to the middle class so as to garner even more federal money.
4. Offers states assistance in the implementation of "best practices" to reduce the substitution of private coverage with government coverage.
5. Provides funding to expand participation.

So there we have it. The Children have little to do with this expansion of the welfare state. The real goal is schalami schlice schocialism in American health insurance, with all of the perversities that inexorably will accompany it. And when costs grow and spending controls take the form of ever-tighter limits on provider reimbursements, yielding a shrinking supply of services to The Children, we will discover the eternal truth that the expansion of government coverage is the opposite of health care.

Posted by Benjamin Zycher at September 24, 2007 05:10 PM

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