By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon Many Coloradans with jobs say they can no longer afford health insurance, a new analysis from the Colorado Health Access Survey has found. Nearly one-third of Coloradans more than 1.5 million people are either uninsured or underinsured, according to the initial survey results that were released in November. New analysis shows that 85 percent of uninsured Coloradans say they dont have health insurance because its too expensive. Job loss and poverty used to be the key causes for poor health coverage. But the landscape in Colorado is changing dramatically. Today, a good job no longer guarantees…
Category: Featured - Part 17
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon The battle over contraception has escalated in Colorado with Planned Parenthood officials calling out Colorados Attorney General for opposing federal birth control mandates. Attorney General John Suthers signed a letter this month along with 11 other attorneys general demanding a reversal of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services new requirement that health plans offer birth control coverage. We strongly oppose the unconstitutional approach taken by the proposed contraceptive coverage mandate, the letter reads. We believe it represents an impermissible violation of the Constitutions First Amendment virtually unparalleled in American history. Tapping into the rage…
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions COLORADO SPRINGS An attack seizes Chaz Moores body, stealing much of his breath. Spasms in his throat, lungs and diaphragm cause the 17-year-old to speak in hiccups, one syllable at a time. He says it feels like a grown man is jumping on his chest as the muscles in his belly roll like waves. Chaz opens a jar labeled MMJ, pulls out some fresh green buds and crumbles the marijuana into a small pipe. He lights up the bowl and inhales as deeply as possible through the spasms, turning to blow smoke out his…
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions Hes 16 but his baby face makes him look a little older than 10, his age when he first tried marijuana. I smoke marijuana every single day all day long, the teen said during a lunch period spent hanging out in a park outside his downtown Colorado Springs high school. It develops brain cells. That is a complete and true fact, he said. It kills weak brain cells. It does affect your lungs but its better than smoking cigarettes. Dozens of students interviewed across Colorado as part of an investigation by Education News Colorado,…
By Rebecca Jones of Education News Colorado and Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions Sometime on Saturday, Steve Ackerman sold his last joint. His Organic Alternatives, a medical marijuana dispensary in Fort Collins, is one of 23 in this laid-back university town forced to close by Tuesday after residents voted to ban dispensaries. I wont continue in the medical marijuana industry, said Ackerman, who opened his comfortable saloon-like dispensary two years ago. But I will continue to support it, and Ill continue to help fight for what I think is right. Marijuana should not be prohibited. Cruise south a little less…
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions Shes not the stereotypical stoner, zoned out in a haze of smoke and flunking out of school. Emma is a graduate of Palmer High School in Colorado Springs, known for its prestigious International Baccalaureate program and for attracting a diverse student body. But Palmer holds another distinction and so does Emma, whose name has been changed to protect her identity. The downtown Springs school posted one of the highest increases in drug violations reported by any Colorado school in the past four years. In 2007-08, Palmer reported two drug violations; in 2010-11, it was…
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon of Solutions and Nancy Mitchell of Education News Colorado A handful of students from Denvers East High School recently spent a warm January lunch period huddled against a brick home two blocks from the school, passing a joint and discussing the merits of medical marijuana. It smells better than what you get on the street, they say, and is more potent. The buds are whole, not ground up like oregano. I get top shelf, boasts a 16-year-old boy. My cousin works at a dispensary. So he brings maybe two zips (plastic bags) a day that theyre…
By Katie Kerwin McCrimmon The call came last fall while the young single dad was at his construction job. It was the hardest day of my life, he said. The mans son, an East High School freshman, had been busted with baggies of marijuana at a Colfax Avenue parking garage adjacent to the school. His arrest was one of 18 at East for marijuana possession last year and among the 179 arrests for marijuana possession or sale at 43 Denver schools during 2010-11, according to Denver police records. The boy said he purchased the marijuana from a senior at school….
By Diane Carman Despite the spirited testimony of seven opponents to routine circumcision, the Senate Health and Human Services Committee Thursday voted 6 to 3 to restore Medicaid funding for the procedure. A change in the long bill, the budget document developed by the Joint Budget Committee, dropped funding for the procedure last year, making Colorado one of 18 states to defund circumcision under Medicaid. Senate Bill 90, introduced by Sen. Joyce Foster, D-Denver, would restore the funding, estimated at $186,500 annually. Foster told the committee that the bill was about disease prevention, fairness and social justice. More important, she…
By Diane Carman When the Colorado Springs City Council voted 9 to 0 last weekto endorse a proposed lease agreement between the University of Colorado Hospital and city-owned Memorial Health System, it moved the Rocky Mountain region one step closer to a tectonic change in the landscape of health care. If Colorado Springs voters approve the plan, the University of Colorado Hospital (which is affiliated with the university, but is an independent legal and financial entity) will assume administration of the nonprofit Memorial Hospital. That would be one more step in the long-term drive to expand the University of Colorado…