$1.9 million annually for mentally disabled care.

[aqwertyuiop]

http://bostonherald.com/print/1062393631

New York spends $5,118 per day per patient in state facilities for the mentally disabled, equivalent to $1.9 million a year per patient. “Personal care” for the home bound is a New York Medicaid benefit that includes grocery shopping and housekeeping, and it costs as much as $150,000 a year per recipient.

A congressional committee is calling for a federal investigation of New York’s Medicaid spending. But

 

[LongDrySpell]

For the record, the people who have to live in state-run facilities are not like the nice boy with Down Syndrome who bags your groceries at the local market - he probably lives in a group home (where his daily cost of care is likely between $100 and $350, depending on his needs).

The people who still live in state-run facilities require round-the-clock medical and nursing care, not to mention armies of therapists and caregivers. They need custom-fitted wheelchairs and beds because they have skeletal deformities, have to be repositioned every two hours or less to prevent bedsores, and take many, many medications every day (most to prevent seizures). Most of them don't "eat" in the traditional sense, they are fed carefully formulated medical diets through gastrostomy or jejunostomy tube.

I know this because it is what I do - in Wisconsin, not New York, where our daily rate is right around $950/person, and our annual budget for just the facility I work in is around $70 million. (If you want the exact figures I can get them on Monday, it is all public information.)

Before you criticize, maybe go sign up as a volunteer in one of those facilities, and actually MEET the patients.

 

[mercury14]

http://bostonherald.com/print/1062393631

New York spends $5,118 per day per patient in state facilities for the mentally disabled, equivalent to $1.9 million a year per patient. “Personal care” for the home bound is a New York Medicaid benefit that includes grocery shopping and housekeeping, and it costs as much as $150,000 a year per recipient.

A congressional committee is calling for a federal investigation of New York’s Medicaid spending. But

[The article's author] Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and the author of “Beating Obamacare.”

I like how she says Obamacare is going to shut down schools.

Your link mentions that Ohio governor Kasich did a 180 and is now going to participate in the Obamacare Medicaid expansion. Another one bites the dust.

 

[Lorilei]

So, since you went to the trouble to make this thread, I suppose you would prefer that they NOT be cared for?

 

[dolf]

“Personal care” for the home bound is a New York Medicaid benefit that includes grocery shopping and housekeeping, and it costs as much as $150,000 a year per recipient.

if a person is so disabled that they cannot shop or clean for themselves, would you prefer they starved to death in squalor?

it is less expensive to care for people in their homes than in institutions. people living in their own homes may be so disabled that they require two carers and a hoist to move them when they require toileting and diaper changes. they may be so disabled that they need someone to spoon feed them and wipe their nose! how exactly can these people earn extra income to pay for cleaners?

it's distressing enough to have your health deteriorate to the point where strangers have to wash your arse for you, without being painted as scroungers who drain society. it could happen to any one of us. a stroke, a degenerative disease, an accident, old age.

yes, costs need to be kept down. but not at the expense of essential services.

 

[phrodeau]

At least the NRA makes sure that they can all get their hands on guns.