Monday, February 14, 2005

Medicaid proposal worries health workers (Florida) Daytona Beach News-Journal story - "Mental health advocates are worried a proposal by Gov. Jeb Bush to limit which prescription drugs people on Medicaid can receive will cause people like Henderson to not get the proper drugs and wind up in hospitals, jails or homeless. 'It's bad medicine and bad economics and a bad policy to be proposing,' said Bob Sharpe, president of the Florida Council for Community Mental Health and the state's former Medicaid director. Bush and the state Agency for Health Care Administration are asking the Legislature to approve the plan, expected to save $292 million, because drug spending is the fastest growing part of the Medicaid budget, agency officials say."