Shasta County could lose 900 jobs if Medi-Cal changed

March 17--Shasta County stands to lose as many as 900 jobs within the healthcare industry and $147 million in business revenue if plans to repeal Medi-Cal go forward.

The numbers were analyzed by Partnership Health Plan of California, a Medi-Cal managed care program, and the Shasta Health Assessment and Redesign Collaborative, a group compiled of healthcare leaders throughout Shasta County.

According to their analysis, the lost funding could hurt businesses and healthcare for residents.

"People don't understand the ripple effect," said Doreen Bradshaw, executive director of the Health Alliance of Northern California and SHARC member.

In Shasta County alone, nearly 60,000 people have signed up with Medi-Cal through Partnership Health Plan, and of them, 16,000 people who worked low-wage jobs without insurance became eligible for Medi-Cal in 2014.

Partnership manages care plans for 14 counties, with more than 566,000 members living in the North State and along the coast. Since people became insured, ER visits across all the counties decreased by 37 percent.

"We had more access to preventive care and less visits to the emergency room," Bradshaw said.

If plans to repeal were to go forward, neighboring Siskiyou County would lose 288 jobs and $46 million in revenue.

Bradshaw added that if the Affordable Care Act were repealed and people lost insurance coverage, local emergency rooms might have to bear the brunt of unreimbursed costs.

Healthcare has become a a hot topic at lawmakers' town hall meetings. LaMalfa held a telephone town hall early March where questions about healthcare were a significant part of the conversation. While he supported the newly written American Health Care Act, he reminded people that the Affordable Care Act would remain in place until 2020.

According to the California Employment Development Department, the local hospitals and clinics remain a vital employer in the county.

Bradshaw said the next step is to meet with stakeholders, others in the healthcare industry and with legislators, including Rep. Doug LaMalfa, to discuss what kind of economic impact this could have on the county.

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