By host Tom Ashbrook:

If you’re poor and sick in America, God help you. No one knows what to do with the cost of helping you out. Look at the headlines. Yesterday, a U.S. Senate committee voted to cut $10 billion from Medicaid and Medicare spending, even as health care costs soar.

Today, there is news that Wal-Mart, the country’s largest employer, is looking to cut spending on health care and hire younger, healthier job applicants. Already, almost half of the children of Wal-Mart’s employees are uninsured or on Medicaid.

Now, Governor Jeb Bush’s Florida is mounting a radical change in how the poor are covered — by privatizing and outsourcing.

Hear how other cash-strapped states are watching Florida’s experiment with capping health care for the poor.

Guests:

Julie Rovner, National Public Radio Health Policy Correspondent;
Jim Frogue, Director of the Center for Health Transformation;
Alan Gomez, Reporter for the Palm Beach Post.;
Holly Benson, Republican Sate Rep. from Pensacola.;
Joan Alker, Senior Researcher at the Georgetown University center for Children and Families.