State gov’ts attack poison control centers

Poison control centers are now an issue. The state of California intends to abolish its PCCs. Washington State has cut PCC funding by 35 percent. Michigan has closed two regional centers in the western part of the state. Tennessee, Oregon, Texas and Utah are considering significant budget cuts for PCCs. (AP, June 25)

PCCs are an inexpensive, effective and publicly funded feature of the U.S. health care system. The centers’ main function is to supply emergency advice about what to do for someone who has taken poison.

Poison control centers were developed as an effective way to help save lives and avoid unnecessary medical care. Hundreds of thousands of people use them every year in California.

About half of the nation’s yearly 2.5 million calls to such centers involve children under 5 years old, who often experience the material world by putting things in their mouths. Twenty percent of the calls to the centers come from medical personnel asking what to do for patients.

California’s PCCs cost $5.9 million a year, and the state has to fill a $23 billion budget gap. Not that $5.9 million would do much to fill the gap, but the state authorities take the position that every little bit helps.

If California’s cuts go through without much resistance, the states mentioned above and many others—all under tremendous budget pressure—will probably move to cut their PCCs.

According to a June 24 National Public Radio report, replacing PCCs with emergency room visits would cost $70 or $80 million a year. As one PCC worker put it, the kids would be getting “a $2,000 ER glass of milk” rather than a much cheaper one from their home refrigerator. The PCCs in California recommend a trip to the ER in only about 20 percent of cases.

But it’s not just the extra cost that makes the cuts stupid and cruel. When poor parents or parents without health insurance consider the cost of an ambulance and/or an ER visit, they may wait in many cases. Some waits could well be life threatening. Parents may also be reluctant to go back to the ER for follow-up, while PCCs make follow-up phone calls the same day and a day later.

What California wants to do is take a small, socialized cost—amounting to about 23 cents per year for each adult in California—and push it onto individuals, who will end up paying a much higher price.

It’s not just outrageous stupidity that has led the budget authorities to move to abolish PCCs. It’s not just a ruling-class desire to use the financial crisis to remove every social gain that the working class has won—from poison control to public housing, social security and public education. It’s all of that, plus a cold and cruel calculation that forcing a privatized response to poisoning will take place without major public outcry.