STUDY: ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS' CARE COSTS STATE $677 MILLIONS

Conducting interviews on this topic is the founder and president of the Minuteman Project Jim Gilchrist.



AUSTIN ˜ The state of Texas and local hospital districts spent an estimated $677 million to provide health care to illegal immigrants in a year, a new study says.



The survey, issued by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, said that most of the money ˜ $597 million ˜ was spent by local hospital districts for the immigrants' care during the state's fiscal year that ended on Aug. 31, 2006.



Lawmakers from both parties said they were not surprised by the millions spent and expressed hope that the report, required by the 2007 Legislature, will help prompt Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform legislation.



State Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, said the study only tells half of the story.



He noted that the immigrants contribute to government coffers by paying sales and property taxes.



The report said that in the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 2007, the state spent $80 million under the Texas Emergency Medicaid program, which pays hospitals to provide life-saving care, including labor and delivery services, to patients living here illegally. The state also paid $1.2 million to provide services to undocumented immigrants in family violence shelters.



Federal law requires hospitals and ambulance services to provide care to anyone needing emergency treatment regardless of their citizenship, legal status or ability to pay.



Harris County's cost

The Harris County Hospital District provided $203.5 million in uncompensated care to illegal immigrants in 2006, the report said.



But county hospital district officials disputed the report's numbers, noting that they were calculated on the basis of charges instead of costs. They said charges are inflated, typically double the actual costs of services to taxpayers.



"The cost of health care to undocumented immigrants is something we worry about, something we monitor, but we don't want to overstate it," said David Lopez, president and CEO of the Harris County Hospital District. "It's not an overwhelming percentage of our budget."



Lopez said the actual cost is 10 to 14 percent of the hospital district's budget, or about $100 million to $120 million.



About 80 percent of the district's illegal immigrant patients were ...