A new Florida law requires all hospitals in the state accepting Medicaid to ask patients about their immigration status.
Tampa-area hospitals have now pledged such a requirement will do nothing to affect their ability to provide care nor put any patients in potential legal jeopardy, according to a July 7 Tampa Bay Times report.
Clearwater-based BayCare, St. Petersburg-based Johns Hopkins All Children's and Tampa General Hospital were among systems promising to keep up the same level of care and to reassure immigrants that they are legally safe, irrespective of their status.
"While the new Florida law requires hospitals to ask about a patient's legal status, the patient/parent/guardian is not required to answer the question to receive services, and the patient/parent/guardian may decline to answer the question," an All Children's spokesperson told the Times.
Nevertheless, the numbers of patients deciding not to respond will also be sent to authorities in quarterly reports, exacerbating patient concerns about their immigrant status being uncovered, critics argue. Such people will not have their names reported. Some immigrants are leaving Florida because of the law, according to the report.
The law also requires employers with more than 25 workers to verify the immigration status of their workers and invalidates driver's licenses issued in other states for undocumented people, the report said.