To the editor:

Two items this week merit the attention of Kansans concerned about health care. The first was the president’s stated intention to alter Medicare so that more beneficiaries receive prescription drug coverage. Left unstated was his intention to do this by paying HMOs more so they will continue to do business with the federal government.

Instead of strengthening Medicare, most health policy analysts see this as a step toward dismantling it, putting Medicare beneficiaries at the mercy of the same corporate bureaucrats he denounced elsewhere in his speech. Medicare HMO beneficiaries already receive prescription drug benefits, but the reason this hasn’t been successful is that HMOs cannot make enough profit off this market. As HMOs have left Medicare, so have beneficiaries left HMOs, with enrollment dropping almost 25 percent last year.

The second item comes from the most recent newsletter of the American Public Health Assn. In its annual rankings of legislators on public health issues, Kansas, was one of only three states, with Tennessee and Texas, to have both senators score “zero on key major public health funding issues voted on in the last two years. In addition, three of our four congressional representatives also scored perfect zeroes, with only Rep. Dennis Moore separating our state from a complete legislative rejection of public health support.

There will be much rhetoric surrounding health care in the coming months. Readers should be careful to read intent into both the words and actions of our political leaders before assuming that our health care problems are being remedied.

Michael Fox,

Lawrence