Nancy Griffin, state director for the AARP, favors SCHIP expansion (“Raise tobacco tax, help kids” July 26, 2007). She is convinced that 6 million children will die from smoking, and 9 million have no health insurance. These numbers are inaccurate.
Since 1997, SCHIP has covered the uninsured. States generously enrolled able-bodied adults, and expanded a program designed to insure low-income children. Further expansion will weaken a program that has already lost focus, and burden the American taxpayer unnecessarily.
John Dale Dunn MD JD([email protected]) is an emergency physician and policy advisor to The Heartland Institute, a national nonprofit research and education organization.
