I’d like to thank Rep. Michael Saxl for proposing LD1303 and encourage members of the Health and Human Services Committee to continue to support it. This proposal could extend health insurance coverage to 23 percent of Maine’s uninsured.

Expanding medical coverage for low-income people is an issue that is close to my heart. My family went without health insurance for many years.

As a Girl Scout leader in a small town in Aroostook County, I remember other troop leaders expressing concern that our troop was a liability to the Girl Scouts of America because so many members had no health coverage. These were children with at least one working parent who were ineligible for Medicaid, but whose families could not afford health insurance.

I am grateful that Maine state legislation has extended coverage to many such children and some of their parents. With this coverage families are able to seek medical care sooner and prevent medical crisis. This saves them suffering, and saves our hospitals from having to absorb the cost of intensive care, a cost that is passed on in increased health insurance premiums.

Through Cub Care the rate of children who are uninsured in Maine has been reduced from 16 percent in 1995 to 6 percent in 2000. Both Gov. Angus King and Commissioner Kevin Concannon of the Department of Human Services acknowledged last October that this investment has paid off. Medicaid itself is a cost-effective program, spending only about four cents on the dollar to deliver health benefits while private insurance companies spend about 25cents on the dollar. Beyond this, Maine receives two federal dollars for every state dollar spent on the Medicaid program and three federal dollars for every state dollar spent covering children through Cub Care. Thus Medicaid brings money into the state.

Many private insurance agents, such as Sen. John Martin of Eagle Lake, support LD 1303 because they believe it will reduce health insurance costs. In these uncertain times expanding Medicaid coverage to low-income people is a worthwhile investment.

LD 1303 would raise the income eligibility of children receiving this coverage from 200 percent to 300 percent of the federal poverty line, and the income eligibility of their parents to receive coverage from 150 percent to 200 percent of the federal poverty line. It would also expand health care to a previously uninsured group, low-income adults without children.

I became familiar with the needs of uninsured adults while working with survivors of domestic violence. I saw women with serious medical conditions in fear of losing Medicaid as their children came of age. Others faced losing health insurance if they divorced abusive men. Still others without insurance found themselves in medical crisis. One such woman came close to dying of a heart condition that required costly surgery and left her disabled.

I am again without health insurance as I have taken off a year from work to pursue graduate studies full-time at the University of Maine. So far I have been fortunate enough to stay healthy, but one of my acquaintances has gone through a painful ordeal. The hospital denied her the normal procedure to relieve her pain because she lacked health insurance and her condition was not considered crucial.

She stopped taking painkillers after a couple of days because they made her too groggy to work. She did not feel she could take time off from work because she is in financial crisis, partly because of testing that she has undergone for this condition and partly because of another medical condition that needs attention. Her co-workers were flexible and filled in for her when the pain was too severe. Fortunately the most painful condition has remitted.

LD 1303 proposes adding 50 cents a pack to the cigarette tax in order to create a fund that will pay for the expanded health coverage. In spite of research confirming that tax increases on cigarettes discourage smoking this proposal makes me bristle. I believe we should all shoulder the responsibility of providing medical coverage for those who can’t afford it, rather than delegating this responsibility to a minority. I would, however, support adding 50 cents to the cigarette tax if this were the only way the state will consider funding the proposal. The Health and Human Services Committee is waiting for the budget to be settled before it proceeds with a second workshop on LD 1303.

I encourage all those who supports expanding medical coverage to voice their support to their legislators and to House Speaker Michael Saxl.

Fran DeMaio is a resident of Orono and a graduate student in social work at the University of Maine.