Governor Rendell Offers Coverage to 29,000 on AdultBasic Waiting List; Unveils New...

Governor Rendell Offers Coverage to 29,000 on AdultBasic Waiting List; Unveils
New Policy to Improve Quality of Care for the Low-Income and Pennsylvanians
With Disabilities

HARRISBURG, Pa., Jan. 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Governor Edward G. Rendell
today said that 29,000 uninsured adults who have been waiting for coverage
since 2006 can now be added to the adultBasic insurance program and said if
his Cover All Pennsylvanians program had been enacted, more than 70,000 people
still on the waiting list would have also been able to receive coverage.

During a Capitol news conference, the Governor also announced that the state
has taken steps to eliminate preventable, serious adverse events at acute care
general hospitals participating in the Medical Assistance program. Consistent
with his Prescription for Pennsylvania health care reform plan, the new policy
places Pennsylvania at the forefront among state Medical Assistance programs
in addressing these avoidable health care occurrences.

"With my Prescription for Pennsylvania, we have been working hard to make sure
that all Pennsylvanians have access to quality, affordable health insurance,"
Governor Rendell said. "Today we have given 29,000 uninsured adults the
opportunity to receive adultBasic health coverage at a monthly premium of
about $33.50. We have also instituted a program to improve the quality of
hospital care that our Medical Assistance recipients receive. Both of these
announcements are good news.

"While the individuals who have been on the adultBasic waiting for up to 18
months can finally heave a sigh of relief, there are still 70,000 people on
the waiting list and hundreds of thousands more Pennsylvanians who have no
affordable options in sight. Of course, all these folks would be provided
immediate access to coverage if the legislature were to pass my Cover All
Pennsylvanians proposal because that program would fold all current adultBasic
enrollees as well as the waiting list into the program.

"And, even more worrisome is the fact that nearly 5,000 eligible people apply
for coverage, but end up on the adultBasic waitlist each month. The
application rate is growing at a rate higher than anytime in the program's
history. We must do more than offer a band-aid solution to stem the increasing
flow of the needs of the uninsured. CAP would do that."

The Governor also said that if the General Assembly had passed CAP last March
when HB700 (the Rx for PA legislation) was introduced, the federal matching
monies that the state would have received would have covered an additional
56,324 people per month on average. That means that without any other proposed
funding sources, 104,218 people would have been receiving some coverage.

"We could have pretty much wiped out the waiting list," the Governor said.
"That wouldn't have solved our entire problem, because there are hundreds of
thousands of people who haven't applied for adultBasic because of the huge
waiting list. And the adultBasic enrollees don't have prescription drug
coverage, which CAP does. But it would have allowed us to start to make a
dent."

People who are on the waiting list for adultBasic have the option to pay about
$298 a month for this coverage. If they had to buy private health insurance,
they would pay considerably more.

There are currently 50,117 Pennsylvanians enrolled in the program. With
today's action, there have been 15 wait-list offerings to nearly 260,000
individuals since the Governor took office. This latest offering will likely
reduce the adultBasic waiting list from 100,000 people to roughly 70,000.

Governor Rendell again urged the General Assembly to make expanded access to
health care a priority in the coming weeks and months.

"It is my hope that we can sit down and work out an achievable plan for health
care, certainly before the summer recess. We hope, eventually, to add all
800,000 uninsured Pennsylvanians to CAP. If we can pass CAP in May or June, we
can start enrolling Pennsylvanians in the fall. AdultBasic is a good,
temporary stopgap...for those families, but it's not nearly enough."

AdultBasic offers necessary benefits -- including preventative care, physician
services, diagnosis and treatment of illness or injury, in-patient
hospitalization, out-patient hospital services, emergency accident care and
medical care -- to uninsured Pennsylvanians between the ages of 19 and 64. For
eligibility and enrollment information, call 1-800-GO-BASIC or visit the
Pennsylvania Insurance Department's Web site, http://www.ins.state.pa.us.

AdultBasic is funded by proceeds from the commonwealth's share of the national
tobacco settlement and is augmented through General Fund allocations and
through the Community Health Reinvestment Agreement negotiated by the state
with Pennsylvania's four Blue Cross Blue Shield plans.

The second announcement the Governor made today focused on making quality
health care accessible to Pennsylvania's most vulnerable citizens.

"Too often we learn that during an extended hospital stay, patients have
received care that poses serious and sometimes fatal health risks," the
Governor said. "According to the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment
Council, these unnecessary errors are costing Pennsylvania businesses,
consumers and taxpayers over $960 million annually. Through this initiative,
we are taking steps to ensure that payment for services through the Medical
Assistance program is made to hospitals based on their efforts to provide
quality care to our consumers."

Based on National Quality Forum standards, the Department of Public Welfare,
in collaboration with the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of
Pennsylvania developed the new policy to help in identifying preventable,
serious adverse events and provide a starting point for health care facilities
to establish measures and actions to be taken to actively improve the safety
of patient care.

Under the newly established guidelines, preventable serious adverse events can
be identified as; surgical events, such as surgery performed on the wrong body
part or patient; patient protection events, such as an infant discharged to
the wrong family; environmental events, such as a patient death associated
with a fall while being cared for in a healthcare facility; and care
management events, such as a patient death or serious disability associated
with a medication error.

In making payments to acute care general hospitals, the department will
consider whether the event was preventable, within control of the hospital,
occurred during an inpatient admission and/or resulted in significant harm.

For more information on the Medical Assistance program or to view the
Preventable Serious Adverse Events bulletin, visit http://www.dpw.state.pa.us.

For information about Governor Rendell's Cover All Pennsylvanians proposal and
the Prescription for Pennsylvania, visit http://www.rxforpa.com.

The Rendell administration is committed to creating a first-rate public
education system, protecting our most vulnerable citizens and continuing
economic investment to support our communities and businesses.To find out more
about Governor Rendell's initiatives and to sign up for his weekly newsletter,
visit his Web site at: http://ww.governor.state.pa.us.

Additional media contacts:
Amy Kelchner, GOHCR - 717-346-8379;
Rosanne Placey, PID - 717-787-3289;
Stacey Witalec, DPW - 717-787-4592

Editor's Note: The chart below shows the number of uninsured adults by county
and the uninsured rate per capita. It also shows how many people in each
county currently receive adultBasic and how many are on the waiting list.

County Uninsured % Adults Adult Basic
Adults who are Enrollment 1/08
(19-64)* Uninsured Waitlist
* 1/08 Adult Basic

Adams 6,472 12.8% 1,037 225
Allegheny 108,835 15.7% 7,882 5,101
Armstrong 5,247 13.2% 780 490
Beaver 13,734 14.1% 1,454 845
Bedford 3,327 11.8% 680 543
Berks 17,959 8.9% 3,276 757
Blair 9,817 13.8% 1,159 720
Bradford 4,690 13.5% 697 369
Bucks 17,655 5.0% 3,627 1,727
Butler 3,408 3.4% 1,596 954
Cambria 11,295 14.3% 1,400 1,160
Cameron 185 6.5% 51 38
Carbon 4,514 13.8% 683 364
Centre 8,307 10.6% 632 395
Chester 25,790 10.0% 2,166 935
Clarion 2,423 11.0% 317 238
Clearfield 6,121 13.5% 1,083 688
Clinton 2,764 14.1% 234 184
Columbia 4,374 12.8% 495 221
Crawford 8,814 18.7% 755 511
Cumberland 8,022 6.8% 2,085 441
Dauphin 12,505 8.6% 2,303 430
Delaware 23,815 8.0% 4,267 2,023
Elk 2,041 10.8% 266 227
Erie 10,340 7.2% 2,658 1,714
Fayette 11,833 14.8% 1,716 1,138
Forest 663 27.0% 45 45
Franklin 10,433 14.2% 834 294
Fulton 1,247 15.4% 97 58
Greene 2,637 12.5% 321 240
Huntingdon 2,525 11.1% 365 254
Indiana 6,376 13.4% 933 575
Jefferson 4,139 16.7% 361 343
Juniata 1,841 14.6% 257 111
Lackawanna 11,420 10.3% 1,315 780
Lancaster 11,278 4.4% 5,141 929
Lawrence 5,773 11.8% 751 601
Lebanon 7,231 10.7% 1,072 238
Lehigh 14,597 8.4% 3,572 869
Luzerne 17,661 10.6% 2,202 1,217
Lycoming 7,636 12.0% 599 340
McKean 1,500 6.5% 564 253
Mercer 10,039 16.5% 950 580
Mifflin 2,672 10.6% 575 229
Monroe 10,470 13.1% 1,625 757
Montgomery 23,060 5.3% 3,613 2,436
Montour 973 10.5% 66 34
Northampton 22,024 15.2% 2,034 538
Northumberland 4,503 9.0% 981 427
Perry 4,107 16.1% 457 136
Philadelphia 138,950 17.3% 14,298 7,661
Pike 3,714 13.3% 566 332
Potter 1,329 13.4% 232 160
Schuylkill 8,252 10.3% 1,139 482
Snyder 2,419 12.3% 328 127
Somerset 4,877 11.4% 902 725
Sullivan 352 10.8% 79 41
Susquehanna 4,025 17.0% 513 329
Tioga 7,721 35.6% 671 335
Union 2,444 13.9% 179 95
Venango 2,186 6.9% 566 409
Warren 5,325 22.6% 416 255
Washington 8,996 8.3% 1,252 942
Wayne 3,167 12.4% 573 325
Westmoreland 9,682 4.7% 3,032 2,297
Wyoming 1,054 6.7% 305 132
York 23,055 10.5% 3,136 748

TOTAL 746,640 100,216 50,117

Figures derived from the 2004 Health Insurance Survey conducted by Market
Decisions LLC for the Pennsylvania Insurance Department. This chart does not
reflect what portion of the uninsured may be eligible or may qualify for CHIP,
adultBasic, Medicaid, or any other government program.

CONTACT: Chuck Ardo 717-783-1116

SOURCE Pennsylvania Office of the Governor

Chuck Ardo of the Pennsylvania Office of the Governor, +1-717-783-1116