Judge: County illegally denied medical treatment

[question everything]

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Judge: County illegally denied medical treatment

By: GIG CONAUGHTON - Staff Writer
North (San Diego) County Times

SAN DIEGO ---- Thousands of the county's poor and sick appeared to score a big victory Friday when a Superior Court judge ruled that the county of San Diego illegally denied them medical care and could no longer use income limits to bar them from receiving treatment.

The judge also ruled that the county must reimburse all the people they have denied care for any health treatment they have received and not paid for their problems.

But county officials said late Friday that it may be too soon for many of those people to celebrate ---- because the issue could end up back in court by the end of the year.

A class-action lawsuit filed in January on behalf of five county residents argued that the county's $802 monthly income limit to be eligible for its County Medical Services program ---- which is required by law to be a "safety net" for poor adults who cannot get medical care elsewhere ---- was illegal. Three of the five residents lived in North County, including a Ramona woman who alleged that her cancer progressed from treatable to inoperable after the county denied her care.

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http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2005/11/19/news/top_stories/22_36_1211_18_05.txt


Contact staff writer Gig Conaughton at [phone] or [e-mail].