Immigrant rights advocates on Friday continued to push for one of their top budget priorities: full funding for state-run health care programs that benefit noncitizens, regardless of their immigration status.
Those programs offer health coverage for low-income individuals who would otherwise qualify for Medicaid if not for their immigration status. They have been the source of controversy in the General Assembly, especially after the initial cost of the programs far outpaced the original estimates, forcing Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration to begin capping enrollment and instituting other cost-cutting measures last year.
But advocates for those programs unveiled a new report Friday by the University of Illinois Chicago’s Great Cities Institute that purports to show how the benefits of providing health coverage to the state’s immigrant population extend beyond those individuals to their families, communities and society at large.
“Ample research has shown that coverage improves labor force participation, which adds value to tax bases and reduces the need for financial assistance,” Samantha Sepulveda, one of the authors of the report, said at a gathering of program supporters Friday in Chicago. “It increases early disease detection which reduces long-term medical costs. It relieves financial hardship which helps individuals and members of their household and also improves health outcomes.”
From NPR Illinois (To go to the actual article, please click on this link.)
