S.F. unveils universal health care plan

By LISA LEFF, Associated Press Writer Tue Jun 20, 11:41 PM ET

SAN FRANCISCO - The city would offer health care to any adult resident, regardless of immigration or employment status, under a plan announced Tuesday.
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The plan, which still needs be approved by the city's Board of Supervisors, is aimed at 82,000 uninsured residents who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid, said Mayor Gavin Newsom. San Francisco already provides universal health care for children.

"Rather than lamenting about the fact that we live in a country with 45.8 million Americans that don't have health insurance ... San Francisco is doing something about it," Newsom said. "San Francisco is moving forward to fulfill its moral obligation."

Newsom stressed that the so-called Health Access Plan was not meant to take the place of private health insurance, but rather provide a way to consistently treat people without insurance so they don't end up seeking medical care in hospital emergency rooms.

Unlike health insurance, for example, the city's plan would not cover the cost of any medical services its participants seek outside San Francisco, and it would not be open to people who work, but do not live, in the city.

It would provide comprehensive preventive and catastrophic health care, covering everything from checkups, prescription drugs and X-rays to ambulance rides, blood tests and surgeries.

The city estimates the plan would cost $200 million a year, an expense that would be borne by taxpayers, businesses that don't already insure all their workers, and participants themselves.

Residents would pay both monthly fees and service co-payments on a sliding scale depending on income. A person with annual earnings at the federal poverty line would pay $3 per month, while someone who makes between $19,600 and $40,000 — or up to 400 percent above the poverty line — would pay an average of $35 per month.

Details of how the employer contribution would work were scheduled to be presented Wednesday to the Board of Supervisors. Approval is expected, though the details could change.

The most recent version, sponsored by Supervisor Tom Ammiano, would require every business with more than 20 employees to pay $1.60 an hour into the system for all employees not already covered by a health plan, no matter how few hours they work.

Laurie Thomas, owner of three restaurants in San Francisco, said that she already contributes to health insurance for her employees who work more than 28 hours a week, but that the hourly mandate Ammiano is proposing would put her out of business.

Title edited by TM

Not many details listed. $200 million a year / 82,000 people is less than $2,500 a year per person. That might cover healthly people but any real illness or procedure eats that up just getting the doctor to leave the golf course. Sounds like a pretty heavy burden to lay on the citizens and not enough info in the report so decide if its a realistic plan.

Note that it's not free to deal with people who don't get checked out until they need that emergency bypass or whatnot. It's not as if we turn fucked up indigents off the streets because they can't pay. This could turn out to be cost-neutral. Keep in mind that a number of countries ultimately spend less per person on health care and end up with people about as healthy as us. The way they do it is to have rich people contribute proportionately more to the health care system than poor people. We don't do that, but now we're moving toward a system where you have to be richer and richer to afford health care at all. I honestly think universal health care is a way to get away from the "we can make you live a few more crappy years if you can spend a lot of money" disease we have.

Yeah, I was going to type up something about the exorbitant cost of emergency room vagrancy and how if this plan cuts down on that then it mgiht be an issure of saving cost rather than matching cost but I was too lazy.