Improving Healthcare Access & Protecting New Mexicans
Special Message From Senator Katy Duhigg:
New Mexico Added Doctors While Legislators and New Mexicans Were Lied to
Legislators were told we needed to give out-of-state medical corporations and insurance companies whatever they want because we lost 250 doctors. Turns out we actually gained almost 4000. All of New Mexico was lied to.
There’s no question that there is a nationwide medical provider shortage.
According to the American Association of Medical Colleges, the primary reason for both the doctor shortage in general and the specialist shortage in particular is the growing, aging population of the United States. Since 2000, the U.S. population has grown by almost 20%, or roughly 58 million people. In addition, every day, more than 11,200 Americans turn 65, and by 2030, about 1 in 5 Americans will be 65 or older, according to U.S. Census data.
But a 50% increase in the number of docs in NM over 4 years demonstrates that NM was doing a good job of attracting the limited nationwide pool of docs before we took away the rights of injured and low income patients for the benefit of billion dollar companies.
What New Mexicans saw over the last year was an incredibly well-financed lobbying campaign that preyed upon their fears and lied to them, so that very wealthy corporations can prioritize their own profit over patient safety without consequence.
New Mexicans should never be put in a position where the groups asking for special treatment are also the only ones with access to data that shows whether their claims are true or not. The Medical Board withholding this information from legislators is not them “not being political” — it is the exact opposite. Refusing to give legislators full information upon which to make a decision was the Medical Board putting their thumb on the scale in an explicitly political manner, and is just one of the many reasons New Mexico desperately needs Medical Board reform.