Doctors to Trump: Deporting Illegal Immigrants Would Be Bad for U.S. Health
The American College of Physicians has a message for Donald Trump and any other presidential contender advocating for mass deportation of illegal immigrants: Any plan to kick out those 12 million people from the country could have severe public health consequences.
On Tuesday, the doctors’ group, which represents 143,000 internists, released a statement urging physicians to take a stand against proposals for mass deportation.
Related: Vast Majority of Americans Say Illegal Immigrants Should Stay
“Large-scale deportation of undocumented residents would have severe and unacceptable adverse health consequences for many millions of vulnerable people,” Dr. Wayne J. Riley, the groups’ president, said in a statement. “Numerous studies show that deportation itself, as well as the fear of being deported, causes emotional distress, depression, trauma associated with imposed family separations, and distrust of anyone assumed to be associated with federal, state and local government, including physicians and other health care professionals providing care in publicly-funded hospitals and clinics.”
That distrust, in turn, could result in sick people not getting medical attention, and in cases of patients with infectious diseases, it could even lead to a public health emergency with tremendous costs to the to the overall health care system, the group warned.
On the other hand, having illegal immigrants in the country carries health care costs, too. Medicaid pays around $2 billion a year for emergency treatment for illegal immigrants, Kaiser Health News reported in 2013, adding that the total represents less than 1 percent of total Medicaid costs.
Related: Birthright Citizenship, the New Immigration Scam
Still, the American College of Physicians said doctors have an ethical obligation to advocate for the health interests of all people, without consideration of their residency status.
“Physicians and other health professionals must remind politicians and policymakers that deporting millions of vulnerable people would have adverse health care consequences, not only for the people directly affected and their families, but also for their local communities and for the United States as whole,” Riley said in the statement. “Instead, we need a balanced immigration policy that ensures access to healthcare for all U.S. residents while recognizing that we need appropriate controls over who is admitted.”
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Budget ‘Chaos’ Threatens Army Reset: Retired General
One thing is standing in the way of a major ongoing effort to reset the U.S. Army, writes Carter Ham, a retired four-star general who’s now president and CEO of the Association of the U.S. Army, at Defense One. “The problem is the Washington, D.C., budget quagmire.”
The issue is more than just a matter of funding levels. “What hurts more is the erratic, unreliable and downright harmful federal budget process,” which has forced the Army to plan based on stopgap “continuing resolutions” instead of approved budgets for nine straight fiscal years. “A slowdown in combat-related training, production delays in new weapons, and a postponement of increases in Army troop levels are among the immediate impacts of operating under this ill-named continuing resolution. It’s not continuous and it certainly doesn’t display resolve.”
Pentagon Pushes for Faster F-35 Cost Cuts
The Pentagon has taken over cost-cutting efforts for the F-35 program, which has been plagued by years of cost overruns, production delays and technical problems. The Defense Department rejected a cost-saving plan proposed by contractors including principal manufacturer Lockheed Martin as being too slow to produce substantial savings. Instead, it gave Lockheed a $60 million contract “to pursue further efficiency measures, with more oversight of how the money was spent,” The Wall Street Journal’s Doug Cameron reports. F-35 program leaders “say they want more of the cost-saving effort directed at smaller suppliers that haven’t been pressured enough.” The Pentagon plans to cut the price of the F-35A model used by the Air Force from a recent $94.6 million each to around $80 million by 2020. Overall, the price of developing the F-35 has climbed above $400 billion, with the total program cost now projected at $1.53 trillion. (Wall Street Journal, CNBC)
Chart of the Day - October 6, 2017
Financial performance for insurers in the individual Obamacare markets is improving, driven by higher premiums and slower growth in claims. This suggests that the market is stabilizing. (Kaiser Family Foundation)
Quote of the Day - October 5, 2017
"The train's left the station, and if you're a budget hawk, you were left at the station." -- Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C.