Romney's Comment on Hospital Care for Uninsured Draws Backlash

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Mitt Romney's remark that uninsured people can receive care in the hospital to avoid dying in their apartments is not sitting well with hospital and insurance groups, according to a Columbus Dispatch report.In an interview with the editorial board of the Columbus Dispatch, Mr. Romney made the following comments:"We don't have a setting across this country where if you don't have insurance, we just say to you, 'Well, tough luck, you're going to die when you have your heart attack.' No, you go to the hospital, you get treated, you get care, and it's paid for, either by charity, the government or by the hospital. … So we don't have people that become ill, that die in their apartment because they don't have insurance. We do care for them."In a reaction, the Ohio Hospital Association pointed to a Wall Street Journal op-ed Mr. Romney wrote in 2006, in which he said "everyone else ends up paying the bill, either in higher insurance premiums or taxes," when uninsured people receive care in the hospital.An OHA spokesperson said the association agrees with Mr. Romney in that op-ed and that "free" care isn't free.The Service Employees International Union released a statement from a retired hospital employee whose uninsured brother died from a heart attack after physicians refused to replace his defibrillator's batteries. "If Mitt Romney believes that you can get the care you need without health insurance, he is living in a dream world," the statement reads.The Kaiser Family Foundation also pointed to its October 2011 study, which concluded that the safety nets of public hospitals, community clinics and others are valuable but "such services are unable to fully substitute for the access to care that insurance provides," according to the report.

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