ABOUT $2 MILLION A MONTH: More illegal immigrants getting emergency treatment at UMC

Jose Diaz Ruiz, a 76-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico, wipes away tears Thursday as he receives dialysis treatment at University Medical Center.

There are now four more of them regularly making their way to the emergency room at University Medical Center. And doctors say the illegal immigrants coming in for dialysis treatment at University Medical Center are sicker than they were before, making their care even more expensive.

Six months after the Review-Journal revealed that 80 illegal immigrants with failing kidneys were running up about $2 million a month in bills for dialysis and other medical treatment at the only publicly supported hospital in Las Vegas, the situation for both patients and taxpayers only continues to worsen.

And despite promises by elected officials to look into the issue, there are few signs it will get better.

Federal laws that require hospitals to give emergency treatment to patients regardless of citizenship, combined with a lack of enforcement of immigration laws, make the problem insoluble right now, hospital and elected officials say.

Unable to receive the dialysis treatments that all American citizens qualify for under Medicare, illegal immigrants who need such treatment across the nation have increasingly turned to emergency rooms.

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ABOUT $2 MILLION A MONTH: More illegal immigrants getting emergency treatment at UMC
lvrj.com