When the Legislature revamped the General Assistance Medical Care program for the poorest adults in the state, many predicted that the new version was unsuited for many living outside the Twin Cities because few services were available in greater Minnesota.
Apparently they were right, says the Mankato Free Press.
Most of the 443 people in Blue Earth County who’d been on the earlier version of GAMC have dropped out, and most now have no insurance, the paper said. Those eligible for the program are extremely poor and do not have children.
Said the paper:
“…64 percent of the people who left the program as of September do not have any insurance at all. Hopes to transfer those poor people to other state-run programs have not yet worked out for the majority of the people who left General Assistance Medical Care.”
Blue Earth County’s human services director, Bob Meyer, isn’t surprised so many left the program, considering that they have to go to the Twin Cities for care. But he wishes they would have signed up for other government programs. Many don’t, because of drug addiction and mental illness, and the confusion about who’s eligible for what.
