It’s no secret that Texas hospitals were lobbying Governor Rick Perry and the Texas legislature to expand Medicad coverage under the ACA – they didn’t.  It’s also no secret that hospitals are closing in states that didn’t expand Medicaid coverage.  Forbes has a rundown:

Hospitals See Troubles In Red States That Snubbed Obamacare’s Medicaid Deal

While record numbers of Americans sign up for the larger Medicaid health insurance program for the poor, financial issues are emerging for medical care providers in the two dozen states that didn’t go along with the expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

Reports out in the last week indicate the gap between those with health care coverage is widening between states that agreed to go along with the health law’s Medicaid expansion and those generally led by Republican legislatures and GOP governors that are balking at the expansion.

The moves against expansion are “beginning to hurt hospitals in states that opted out,” a report last week from Fitch Ratings said. The U.S. Department of Health and Human services has said Medicaid enrollment in the 26 states and the District of Columbia that agreed to go along with and implemented the expansion by the end of May “rose by 17 percent, while states that have not expanded reported only a 3 percent increase,” HHS said in an enrollment update for the Medicaid program.

Because of this purely political decision on the part of red state governors and legislatures people are going to die – even those with conventional insurance. When a local hospital closes and the next nearest hospital is 30 or more miles away people will die needlessly.  This is nothing short of criminal.