SACRAMENTO, Calif. — There's a nonsensical disconnect in California's efforts to provide universal health care. There aren't enough doctors willing to accept the state's small fees for treating low-income patients.
So it's universal health care in name only — despite Gov. Gavin Newsom's repeated boasting about it — because millions of people are denied access to preventive medicine or treatment of their ailments.
Medi-Cal — California's version of Medicaid for the poor — is an unfulfilled promise in too many cases. A third of Californians, including 40% of the state's children, are enrolled in Medi-Cal.
