Don't act rashly on Medevac
July 13, 2006
Assemblyman Peter Biondi is talking up privatizing the state's medical helicopter program. Turning the controls of the air am bulances over to private firms might save $21 million in public money, he says.
The Somerset Republican is busy researching whether a private medevac system might offer the same reliability and safety the public has received from the helicopters now operated by the State Police. If so, Biondi says, he is interested in offering legislation to take the air rescue business out of state hands.
We're all for saving money in tough budget times. But Biondi should wait for a professional preflight check before taking off with this idea. In fact, he should wait for the professional, outside study he himself voted for six months ago.
Biondi and other Assembly members voted in January to have an independent, in-depth review made of New Jersey's entire emergency medical system. That study is to be done by early next year, and a main focus will be the value of the State Police choppers that respond to accident scenes and transport patients between hospitals.
The helicopters, which are operated in conjunction with the Department of Health and Senior Services and the University of Medicine and Dentistry, have been a source of controversy re cently.
The northern base for medevac operations was moved from Newark to Bedminster in February 2005 (for a more central loca tion), and ever since, local residents have been protesting and filing lawsuits, complaining of noise and pollution from the flights.
Biondi's district includes Bedminster, but he insists his push isn't a backdoor attempt to ground flights there, simply a legitimate look at the funding for the whole medevac program. That's good because air rescue is a vital service, with consequences for the public that go far beyond any one town's concerns.
Some 3,000 patients require helicopter transport in a given year, two-thirds of them from accident scenes; others are transferred from one hospital to another. Until recently, the state me devac program handled almost all the calls.
But over the past few years, private helicopter operators have become interested in flying their own medical missions in New Jersey. They claim they can do the job just as well as the state and without the hit to the public treasury.
There are qualms, however, about the private industry's safety record and its charges, which can run $8,000 or more per flight vs. the state's publicly subsidized fee of $1,337. There are questions over whether the ultimate cost to the state economy is lower with a state-subsidized medevac service than if health insurers sud denly had to pay the much higher costs of private flights, costs that could drive insurance rates higher.
These are serious public policy issues, and they deserve a thorough explanation. The state's independent study should provide the needed answers.
