CAPE DOCTOR SAYS PLAN HAS MANY FLAWS

The state bill that would provide an avenue for insuring needy children is opposed locally because it could grow into an intrusive governmental program that would undermine parental rights, opponents say.

Dr. James A. Kinder, a practicing pediatrician in Cape Girardeau since 1948, wrote a letter opposing the bill to the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee. He said the legislation has an attractive surface that hides an unsavory intent.

"They've got a better gimmick on the name now. Who can be opposed to care for kids?" Kinder said. "On the surface it looks wonderful, but when you get down to the bottom of it it's just governmental intrusion."

Kinder said under HB811, which would set up health clinics at local schools, parents would have no input into examinations being conducted or health questions being asked their children.

"You look at some of the areas where it has been tried, and you'll find unhappy parents," he said.

Kinder said Florida and Pennsylvania have similar plans that are state funded and growing out of control.

The bill made it through the Missouri House of Representatives by an 84-71 vote. It passed the Senate committee early Tuesday morning on a 5-4 vote and goes to the Senate floor.

State Sen. Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau, said that with a little more than a week left in the legislative session, the bill may not make it to a vote. He said he will push for the Senate to address the legislation. "We want to confront this bill," the senator said.

Sen. Kinder said the bill may be unconstitutional on many levels and poses a threat to Medicaid funds and parents' supervision of their children's health care.

"The grand design here of the proponents of this bill is to put health-care clinics in every school in the primary grades," Sen. Kinder said.

Sen. Kinder said the effort is "Plan B" of President Clinton's health-care plan. He said the plan is to implement expensive federal- and state-controlled health care "state-by-state, and do it in the name of children so it's harder to say no."

State Rep. Mary Kasten, R-Cape Girardeau, said she supports providing insurance to children but the legislation would eventually provide for the establishment of clinics in schools.

"It's hard to be opposed to getting kids insurance, but this certainly appears to be a lead-in to government takeover," Kasten said.

Cape Girardeau schools Superintendent Dan Tallent said he doesn't see anything in the bill that makes him believe the state is attempting to establish clinics in schools. He said the state has pooled other classes of people, including his own employees, and gotten them better insurance rates.

Tallent said he supports the bill's intention of pooling children into a group and offering discount insurance rates to parents. But if the bill does lead to greater burdens on schools, more legislation is needed to pay the additional expense, he said.

"If the bill's intention is to provide low-cost insurance plans to people who currently can't buy insurance, I'm all for it," Tallent said. "But I am opposed to turning schools into catch-alls. We simply don't have the room or the money."