Sunday, April 18, 2004

Exclusive Report

The monster

By Mark Hornbeck, and Charlie Cain / The Detroit News

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The cost of Medicaid in Michigan continues to mushroom.

* One-quarter of the Michigan’s general fund, its main checkbook, goes to Medicaid.

* Medicaid covers one-third of all births and 70 percent of nursing home expenditures.

* One in seven Michiganians receives Medicaid.

* The Medicaid budget has swollen by 40.2 percent in four years.

* Since its beginning in 1967, the cost of Medicaid has increased at 10 times the inflation rate.

* The state pays $46 million a year for a prescription drug to treat schizophrenia, roughly the same amount it spends to operate Oakland University.

* 73 percent of Medicaid recipients are pregnant women, children or families; 27 percent are elderly citizens.

* Elderly, blind and disabled people make up 27 percent of Medicaid recipients, but account for 70 percent of all expenditures.

* Including federal funds, the state spends more than $7 billion on Medicaid — more than every other area of the state budget except public schools.