Gov. Nixon’s State of the State

Health care in Missouri was certainly on Gov. Nixon’s mind during his State of the State speech last night. He stated the importance of providing a health care system that would attract new businesses to Missouri, but said there are too few people trained in providing such care.

To remedy this, Nixon has “called for the creation and funding of the Caring for Missourians program — an initiative that will coordinate efforts between our two- and four-year institutions to train our next generation of health care workers.” He also plans to increase funding for the Sheltered Workshop Program, which helps people with developmental disabilities.

And if that’s not enough, Nixon resolved to give health care coverage to 62,000 uninsured Missourians, including 27,000 children. He said, “So we must begin the process of reducing the number of uninsured. It’s a massive problem, and in these difficult times, we won’t fix it overnight. But we must make progress, and start heading in the right direction once again.”

All this sounds terrific, if it can be done. However, the budget Nixon presented is worrisome, especially on the health care front. He plans to cut funding in Missouri Telehealth Network, University Hospital and Clinics, Missouri Rehabilitation Center, Missouri Institute of Mental Health and Missouri Kidney Program. In total, there is a difference of over $1 million ($1,163,954, to be exact) between funding for those programs in Fiscal Year 2009 and Nixon’s proposed budget for 2010. You can check out the numbers yourself on page 10 of this pdf.

Hopefully Nixon will be able to pull off everything he said in his speech. Maybe these cuts won’t be as damaging as they appear. We can only wait to find out.

However, even Nixon said in his speech that he is willing to listen to anyone who thinks they have a way to fix our health care system. So if you have an idea, send it to him, and while you’re at it, post it in a comment here!