United Health Care drops out of Badgercare due to the Walker Administrations Rate Cuts. I thought Obama was doing that?

All the while Republicans warned that the Obama plan to limit Medicare and Medicaid premiums would end up forcing providers to drop out, that’s exactly what they’re doing now in Wisconsin, without any hint of embarrassment or accusations of rationing.

What did Scott Walker and the Republican state legislature think would happen when they cut payment rates to providers? They must have known, and perhaps desired this outcome, as a way of proving how bad “government run health care” is.

This is a major problem for Badgercare too, because United Health Care was perhaps the best and biggest provider:

jsonline: After seeing the state cut payment rates in 2011 and then again this year, UnitedHealthcare has opted to end its contract with the state to oversee care for 174,000 people insured through the BadgerCare Plus program in southeastern Wisconsin. UnitedHealthcare will end its contract on Oct. 31.

The health insurer is the largest of the four managed care organizations that won contracts in 2010 from the Department of Health Services for six counties in southeastern Wisconsin.

UnitedHealthcare's decision raises the question of whether the state has cut payment rates too much.