Editorial: Penalizing the sick

Friday, Feb. 9, 2007 | 7:10 a.m.

Under the budget President Bush proposed this week, fewer children would be eligible for Medicaid and funding would be cut for programs that help prevent chronic diseases among children.

The cuts are part of an overall plan that Bush says would slash $101.5 billion from Medicaid and Medicare programs over the next five years. Although Democrats and some Republicans oppose the president's proposal, Bush has said he doesn't need congressional approval and can make some of the cuts through executive orders, The New York Times reported in a recent story.

As usual, Bush's priorities are misplaced. At a time when many states are enacting or considering plans to ensure that all children have medical care, Bush proposes to curtail the number of children in poor families who are eligible for Medicaid. The president says only children whose families have incomes less than twice the federal poverty level should have Medicaid coverage. Under federal guidelines, a family of four lives in poverty if their annual income is $20,650 or less.

Medicaid is offered jointly by federal and state governments, and, as the Times reports, at least 16 states provide coverage to children whose families earn more than twice the federal poverty level. However, plenty of families who live at or just above that income level still struggle to make ends meet.

Bush also is offering no funding increases for cancer research, which, with inflation, amounts to a funding cut. He also wants to eliminate grants that help states pay for programs to prevent childhood obesity and other chronic illnesses.

The federal government must reduce its massive, record-setting deficit so that future generations of Americans are not burdened by it. Bush - who claims his overall $2.9 trillion budget proposal would eliminate the deficit by 2012 - seeks to balance it by cutting medical care for poor children and medical research funding, while retaining his existing tax breaks for industry and the nation's wealthiest residents.