Last Saturday, the Arizona Daily Star published a story I wrote about a dramatic jump in the number of people enrolled in a state insurance program for Arizona’s poorest residents.
The income cutoffs for the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System are so low that some people receiving unemployment insurance are earning too much to qualify. (The limit is $22,050 or less for a family of four per year).
After the story ran I received an email from a man with a heart condition who earns $10 a month too much to enroll. He doesn’t have health insurance through his job and can’t afford private insurance.
For people like him, AHCCCS would be well-served to expand its income limits.
On the flipside I was barraged with feedback from people like Connie Foust, who think the program is too big. Her big beef: undocumented residents.
“How many of these people are illegal aliens,” Foust asked in an email.
“That is where the story is. Until the press in Arizona takes a long hard look at the problem, it cannot be solved and can only hurt those who truly need the help. Every time I read one of these articles I am disgusted by the dishonesty of the reporter,” she wrote.
The answer to Ms. Foust’s question is that undocumented residents do not qualify for regular AHCCCS. Even someone with a green card (a legal resident) would not qualify unless they had been in the country for at least five years. Proof of legal U.S. residency is a requirement.
The exception is a category called “emergency services” with parameters set by the federal government. Anyone — documented or not — qualifies for AHCCCS coverage in that category. Emergency services consists of life-saving medical attention and labor and delivery.
There are 74,000 people statewide enrolled in the emergency services program through AHCCCS — a number that has been declining in recent years. Two years ago it was 80,000.
In any case, it’s always been a small percentage of the total number of people who are enrolled in AHCCCS statewide (a little less than 6 percent at the moment). There are 1.4 million Arizonans on AHCCCS.
Also, it’s important to note that not everyone in “emergency services” with AHCCCS is an undocumented resident. Some of them are legal residents who have been in the U.S. less than five years and others for one reason or another don’t have the correct documentation.
