AHCCCS Transplant funds restored, at a high cost to others.

"The dying are taxpayers, too."
AZ State Capitol/Wes Bolin Plaza
February 28, 2011

http://www.azahcccs.gov/shared/Downloads/News/MedicaidReformPlan.pdf

Under the plan that restored the 2010 AHCCCS (medicaid) cuts, over a hundred fifty thousand "childless adults" in AZ won't receive health care coverage when they get ill, "saving" the state $190 million. Folks whose medical bills reduce their spendable income to less than 40% of the federal poverty rate are also screwed ("saving" the rest of us $70 m).

Not only do we lose federal funds for health care now, but it's guaranteed that we'll be spending more than twice as much incarcerating the mentally ill patients who lose their benefits and can no longer obtain the medications or treatment they need when they decompensate - because the people who voted for this woman are much more willing to spend their taxes on prisons (which so many profit from) than health care for the poor...no wonder we have one mentally ill person in our hospitals for every ten we decide top incarcerate, with little or no care.

That's appalling.

Give my Taxes to AHCCCS!

Thanks a lot, Brewer. You're a real swell human being.

----------------

Janice K. Brewer, Governor
Thomas J. Betlach, Director
801 East Jefferson, Phoenix, AZ 85034
PO Box 25520, Phoenix, AZ 85002
Phone: 602-417-4000

AHCCCS
www.azahcccs.gov
Our first care is your health care

ARIZONA HEALTH CARE COST CONTAINMENT SYSTEM
DATE: April 7, 2011

TO: Interested Stakeholders
FROM: Marc Leib, MD, Chief Medical Officer

SUBJECT: Transplant Restoration

AHCCCS RESTORES COVERAGE OF PREVIOUSLY COVERED TRANSPLANTS FOR ADULTS

As part of the recently enacted budget, the Arizona Legislature adopted Governor Brewer's Medicaid Reform Plan which restores funding of previously covered transplants for adults that were eliminated effective October 1, 2010. Retroactive to April 1, 2011, AHCCCS will once again cover the following transplants for members 21 years of age and older:
•
Pancreas-after-kidney transplants
•
Liver transplants in patients with Hepatitis C
•
Allogeneic unrelated hematopoietic cell transplants
•
Heart transplants in patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathies
•
Lung transplants
•
Heart-lung transplants

Transplants that were not covered by AHCCCS prior to October 1, 2010, including pancreas only transplants, partial pancreas transplants and pancreas islet cell transplants, are not affected by this legislation. Those transplants remain non-covered. In addition to the medically necessary transplants covered for adults, AHCCCS continues to cover all medically necessary, non experimental transplants for members under the age of 21 years as required by EPSDT.

Coverage criteria for restored transplants will be the same as the criteria in place prior to October 1, 2010. Physicians with patients they believe meet the criteria for any AHCCCS covered transplant should contact the AHCCCS health plan in which the patient is enrolled to refer the patient for transplant evaluation.

For more information, please see the AHCCCS website at:

http://www.azahcccs.gov/reporting/legislation/sessions/2010/BenefitChanges.aspx#transplantRestoration