Test Your Medicaid IQ
FUGITFlorida Uniform Governmental
Intelligence Test - Medicaid
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A Health Care Test
For Florida Legislators
One - During the 10 years between 1998 and 2008, the number of Florida residents increased 25% – while the number of Floridians on Medicaid increased 45%.
Given this, a typical Florida Medicaid recipient is probably:
( ) A lazy welfare mother
( ) An illegal alien
( ) Not a registered voter
Two - Per recipient, Florida Medicaid expenditures increased 39% between 1998 and 2008 – at the same time the cost of medical care in the United States increased 50%.
Based on this, Florida's Medicaid program should be:
( ) Privatized
( ) Socialized
( ) Simonized
Three - Companies operated by Wellcare provided a major portion of Florida's residents enrolled in the state's new Medicaid reform Program back when Federal agents raided the firm's Tampa headquarters in 2007. As a result, Wellcare paid more than $80 million in fines for submitting fraudulent bills to the state's Medicaid Reform Program. Undaunted, Wellcare firms gave more than $225,000 to various Florida legislative candidates running for office office in 2008.
Basic ethics suggest any responsible candidate receiving funds from Wellcare should have:
( ) Kept quiet
( ) Kept the money
( ) Kept on truckin'
Four – Broward, Duval and Clay were selected as pilot counties for Florida's pioneer Medicaid Reform Program created in 2006 to reduce the skyrocketing cost of state-funded health care for low income residents.
The following shows the increase in the per recipient cost of state Medicaid funding in the three pilot counties – versus the state-wide average expenditure per Medicaid recipient.
State Medicaid Expenditures – Per Recipient
1998 2008 %
Pilot Counties
Broward $3,090 $4,427 43%
Gen. Population 1,460,890 1,758,494 20%
M'caid Recipients 132,854 216,719 63%
Duval $3,240 $4,109 27%
Gen. Population 753,823 904,971 20%
M'caid Recipients 93,063 142,578 53%
Clay $1,972 $3,731 89%
Gen. Population 134,534 185,168 38%
M'caid Recipients 8,252 19,194 133%
Florida
State-wide $3,126 $4,361 39%
Gen. Population 15,000,475 18,807,219 25%
M'caid Recipients 1,882,096 2,722,486 45%
Based on the above, it's obvious the dramatic Medicaid trends at work in the three pilot Medicaid Reform counties clearly show:
( ) Adam Smith's invisible hand at work
( ) Somebody let the dogs out
( ) The need to implement the Medicaid Reform throughout the state
Five – President Obama and his socialist toadies forced Congress to pass a bill to provide millions of low income Americans with government-funded health care insurance. The following data establishes the trends for uninsured and low income Medicaid patients in Florida's hospitals between 1998 and 2008.
Average Daily Hospital Patient Census
1998 2008
Florida 25,381 31,063 22%
Uninsured 1,232 2,017 64%
Medicaid 3,273 4,962 52%
Medicare 13,702 16,113 18%
Other Insurance 7,174 7,971 11%
Obviously, the above trends reveal:
( ) Poor people need to stop getting sick
( ) Obama's a closet Muslim
( ) Florida needs more sick old people
Six – America is facing a major health care crisis in the 21st century: Like how can the nation's giant health care corporations continue to increase their profit margins – at the same time our aging population gets more health care for fewer dollars?
Which of the following solutions would you favor:
( ) Eliminate Big Government, Medicare and Medicaid
( ) Let Wall Street handle the sick and the poor
( ) Bomb Iran
Seven – No kidding. Something's gotta be done about the skyrocketing cost of health care. Like the cost of medical care increased 54% in SE Florida during the past decade – while the cost of Medicaid increased 35%. Okay. So Medicaid costs didn't go up THAT much. But who cares? The thing is, somebody's gotta do something because the media's got a bug up their ass.
So what can you do as an elected official?
( ) Demand fatter campaign checks from the health care industry.
( ) Join a Teaparty
( ) Privatize Medicaid
Sources: Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration
University of Florida Statistcal Abstract
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