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Sharon R. Bridgeforth of Denver writes:

176,000 kids in our state do not have health insurance. Many of them could get the care they need if Congress reauthorizes and fully funds the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). As this critical issue moves to the Senate floor, we would like to thank Senator Salazar for his commitment to children through his work in the Senate Finance committee.
The faith community represented by Metro Organizations for People offers our encouragement to Senator Salazar to stand firm, accept no less than the $50 billion pledged to SCHIP in the recent budget resolution, ensuring that children will no longer have to use an emergency room as their primary care physician. Further, efforts should also be made to streamline the SCHIP enrollment process.

This letter has not been edited.

READER COMMENTS

Tuff sh**! Have the parents pay for it but don't expect others to pick up the tab.

I know what it is to be uninsured and to have a child uninsured. We remedied that with Medicaid and then added her to our insurance when it was possible. Colorado has a program for low income families. People who don't have insurance either make too much money to qualify or have made a deliberate decision not to buy the insurance. More government money is not the cure. Try adding more personal responsibility. Amnesty Salazar is looking to make peopple forget he would rather represent illegal aliens than Americans or legal immigrants. This program is custom made to help out illegals. VOTE NO.

Yes all those kids without insurance should take the personal responsibility to find a job that has health insurance because this here is America and first it is universal health insurance and the next thing you know we will have to tackle the dismal state of public education. And with a more educated populace there will be less conservatives so we must stop it now.

What kind of morally bankrupt person could be so nonchalant about children who don't have health-care?

momma y!

"Try adding more personal responsibility." she/he/it says.

monster y.

I'm not the non-chalant person. It's the parents. Or did you miss the statistic that over half of the uninsured children qualify for CHHP? Parents don't want to do the paperwork. I know . My sister was one of them.

momma y

"Or did you miss the statistic that over half of the uninsured children qualify for CHHP?"

And the other half?

Why is it societies responsibility to care for children when the parents pump them out arbitrarily? Yes medical services for children is important, but then why have the shot programs gone away? If Salazar and others really care for children should they not fiorst take care of those that are here first before bringing in millions from other places.

One needs to tend to thier yard before complaigning about the nieghbors.

"Why is it societies responsibility to care for children when the parents pump them out arbitrarily?"

Because children don't pick their parents.

The statisticn unisured children are calculated the same way they do the uninsured adults which means that for the four weeks my grand daughter was between insurance she was counted as uninsured which was correct. She is part of that total in another way because we switched her from Medicaid to our medical plan. So she is included at least twice in the statistics which means that two of those uninsured are my grand daughter who has insurance.
Sympathy is good. Poor statistics are not. The actual number of uninsured children is probably much smaller than the one state and any child who is being cared for by grandparents automatically qualifies for Medicaid. They call here every month to tell us that. Guess we might need to make a few changes but to put billions of dollars into a system to reward thet lazy parents is not good either. The immunization program i alive and well and we use it. We also see hundreds of others using it but the program is down to two afternoons a week so there is a long line. I have seen people look at the line and leave. They, perhaps for quite valid reasons, valued their time over the immunizations that day.

An expansion of the current childrens insurance plan to include all children in Colorado would fulfil your hopes but would not insure every child.

As a positive suggestion I would automatically enroll any child who shows up in the ER without insurance. The parents would not have to qualify or do anything more than sign their name and give an address after producing a Colorado ID. How about that approach. Of course there would be a lot of kids who remain uninsured but that would expand it to those in the most need.

I personally know of unwed mothers, (oh the horror of it) who remain unmarried for at least a year so the baby gets medicaid.

Or is it Medicare? I always confuse those two. Unwed and supposedly living alone, the baby is covered.

That is the situation now, no mater how we feel about it.

If they get married and live together, the baby may not have insurance. What parent would pass up any chance to insure their child?

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