Lifeguard, a large regional health care provider, recently revealed that it is having severe financial problems. The California Department of Managed Health Care has appointed a conservator to oversee daily operations and decide whether the HMO has to be shut down.
But the problems of the highly regarded HMO are being mourned by analysts and state health care officials alike, who point to the case as a textbook example of how economic pressures are pinching California's already struggling health plans.
Fewer HMOs translates into fewer options for health care consumers. And the downward spiral of Lifeguard only exacerbates the Bay Area's dearth of not-for-profit insurers and fee-for-service health plans.
Just today a local doctor's group that serves 100,000 patients reports financial difficulty.
It's too bad that the war on terrorism and the administration's focus on invading Iraq are preempting a national debate on infrastructure issues like health care. Short of terrorists' use of a really nasty weapon of mass destruction, deteriorating health care is going to do damage to this country much wider and deeper than a terrorist could ever hope for. And we're doing it to ourselves through lack of action.
And don't get me started on education, dependence on fossil fuels ...
10:48:10 AM 
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