Health Care Burden at UCI

* The Sept. 14 Orange County Voices op-ed article, “For-Profit Plan Wrong Idea for UCI Med Center,” concludes that a cooperative effort is key to the survival of UCI Medical Center and the UCI College of Medicine. We agree.

UCIMC’s strains are shared by all local hospitals, physicians and community clinics who attempt to balance financial solvency with their struggle to care for underfunded Medicare, Medi-Cal, county indigent and uninsured patients. Without a county hospital, the burden to maintain a health care “safety net” for all residents--rich and poor alike--falls on private health care providers, most notably UCIMC.

This burden would ease considerably if all shared the responsibility. For example, HM0s, with the exception of nonprofit Kaiser, do not own hospitals and have no legal exposure to indigent and uninsured patients. Nor do many care for Medi-Cal patients. Today’s for-profit health care and paying shareholder dividends do not equate to charity.

Orange County Medical Assn. believes that by working together, preserving UCIMC and our medical school is a worthy objective and an opportunity to maintain a system of high quality health care accessible by all county residents.

STANLEY C. LOWENBERG

President, OCMA