Lawmakers may restore patients' rides for dialysis

[okarol]

March 5, 2007

Lawmakers may restore patients' rides for dialysis

By Laura Hipp
lhipp@clarionledger.com

Legislators will be pressed this week to restart a transportation program for almost 570 low-income dialysis patients statewide.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Jack Gordon, D-Okolona, said when asked about the program that he intended to "fix it" this week.

House Public Health and Human Service Committee Chairman Steve Holland, D-Plantersville, said he also hoped for a solution early this week.

"We have no money," Holland told representatives Friday.

Last year, lawmakers spent $3 million on transportation for low-income patients on dialysis.

The National Kidney Foundation of Mississippi, which has coordinated the transportation program through Medicaid, ran out of funds in mid-February. The company with the contract had provided free rides until Thursday.

House Bill 1471 was referred to a conference committee Friday so representatives and senators could hash out their differences.

The House wants $3.9 million set aside to fund the program for another year, but the Senate has not agreed.

Until December 2005, Medicaid, under its Poverty Level Aged and Disabled category, paid transportation costs for those getting the treatment.

Medicare then took over drug coverage for those in the PLAD category, leaving patients to pick up costs of getting to and from clinics.

In the Senate this week, final approval may be close on a bill that would ban most abortions in the state. Senate Bill 2391 would make most abortions illegal if Roe v. Wade is overturned. The 34-year-old U.S. Supreme Court decision legalized abortion. Exceptions to the ban would be made in cases of rape or when a pregnant woman's life is in danger.

Incest is not an exception under the bill because state attorneys consider it to be the same as rape. The bill also requires doctors to give women the chance to look at a sonogram and listen to the fetal heartbeat before an abortion. Also, young girls seeking abortions without parental consent would be required to get court approval.

The bill has been tweaked by the House, and Senate Public Health and Welfare Chairman Alan Nunnelee, R-Tupelo, said last Thursday, "My tendency is still to concur."
Staff writer Natalie Chandler contributed to this report.

URL: http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070305/NEWS010504/703050339

[Sara]

I hope they do pay for transportation for those people, but what does the Roe v. Wade have to do with the dialysis bill?   

[okarol]

I hope they do pay for transportation for those people, but what does the Roe v. Wade have to do with the dialysis bill?   

That abortion info follows the "In the Senate this week..." part of the article. I don't edit the articles
but paste them in their entirety, and apparently this one covers more than just the patients without
dialysis transportation, despite the title.