The cost of failure

A new report from the Urban Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation examines the costs of failing to enact health reform for North Carolina.

The study uses projections under a worst case, intermediate case, and best case scenarios. Every scenario is disasterous.

In the best case Medicaid and children’s health insurance spending will rise from $8.6 billion to $14.6 billion in 2019. In the worst case spending will hit $18.5 billion in 2019. Total uncompensated care will rise from $2 billion in 2009 to $5 billion in 2019 in the best case projections.

The number of uninsured will increase from 1.7 million in 2009 to 2.4 million in 2019 in the worst case and 2 million in the best case.

For North Carolina health reform is more than a moral imperative, it’s a financial imperative.