DRUG-WAR PATIENTS' TREATMENT COSTS $4.7M

It has become routine.

A person is shot and wounded in Juarez, a Mexican ambulance carries
the victim across an international bridge and a U.S. ambulance takes
the patient to University Medical Center of El Paso.

Since the start of the Juarez drug war three years ago, 200 people
wounded in Mexico have been treated at El Paso's county-run hospital
at a cost of $4.7 million, according to the latest figures from UMC.
Three-quarters were U.S. citizens.

The number of the patients classified as "victims related to the
violence in Mexico" decreased this year compared with 2009. Hospital
officials said there have been 64 such patients so far this year
compared with 83 a year ago.

Violence in Juarez has reached unthinkable levels spurred by a war
between the Juarez and Sinaloa drug cartels that erupted in 2008.
More than 3,000 people have been murdered in Juarez this year.

As the bloodshed continues to rage, survivors have continued to seek
care in El Paso. Because of federal law, hospitals cannot refuse
emergency help to people on U.S. soil regardless of citizenship. UMC
is the only Level 1 trauma center within 280 miles.

The hospital tries to get bills paid by health insurance plans, but
that is not always possible.

"The patients from Mexico are by and large completely uninsured,"
said UMC spokeswoman Margaret Althoff-Olivas.

UMC statistics show the hospital has been reimbursed about $1.2
million of the $4.7 million total cost from the past three years. The
statistics are as of Dec. 16. Medical costs vary depending on the
severity of the patient's condition.

Some patients required multiple surgeries, some stayed in the
intensive care unit for as long as 30 days, and "in a particularly
egregious case" one patient was hospitalized for nearly a year,
hospital officials said in a letter to President Barack Obama.

"Local taxpayers are footing the bill for the consequences of a
conflict that is occurring on foreign soil," stated the letter by Jim
Valenti, UMC's chief executive officer, and Dr. Jose Manuel de la
Rosa, founding dean of the Texas Tech University Health Sciences
Center at El Paso Paul L. Foster School of Medicine.

The April 16 letter was part of attempts to obtain federal money to
help pay for the care of drug war violence victims.

U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, has tried to get money for UMC as
part of border security bills and the next Merida Initiative, which
supports Mexico in its fight against the drug cartels.

"This is a problem that other cities in the nation, even along the
border, aren't having to deal with," Reyes' spokesman Vincent Perez said.

Gunshot victims from Mexico usually arrive at UMC with little
attention. But that wasn't the case on Jan. 23, 2008, when an
ambulance escorted by five or six El Paso police cars brought the
first victim, a Chihuahua police commander who survived an
assassination attempt.

The hospital went into a lockdown. Doors were locked, police with
assault rifles stood guard, and all visitors entered through metal detectors.

The hospital has not gone to similar heightened security since that
first incident, and officials are confident of current security.

Hospitals are not neutral ground in Mexico, where it is not uncommon
for hit men to finish off targets in emergency rooms.

Doctors, nurses and other medical professionals face other problems
in Juarez, where they are targeted by extortionists charging
protection fees and kidnappers seeking ransom. The situation became
so bad that earlier this month doctors went on a 24-hour strike to
protest the lack of security.

"This particular challenge that UMC has been facing is a direct
result of federal drug policy," El Paso County Judge-elect Veronica
Escobar said. "It is a drug war in Mexico, but that drug war is
linked to drug consumption in the United States."

Escobar wants the federal government to offset the cost of helping
victims of the Juarez drug war in what she expects to be a
financially difficult year ahead for UMC.

Escobar said it is important to remember that the human toll is even costlier.

She said, "What is happening in Mexico is a tragedy all the way
around whether you are mexicano or not, whether you have family there or not."

Patients wounded in Mexico

Patients wounded in Mexico and treated at University Medical Center
of El Paso, with costs incurred before partial reimbursement of $1.2 million.

2010 64 patients - 52 U.S. citizens, 12 Mexican citizens. Total cost:
$1,665,839.

2009 83 patients - 62 U.S. citizens, 21 Mexican citizens. Total cost: $874,279.

2008 53 patients - 37 U.S. citizens, 13 Mexican citizens, 3 legal
immigrants. Total cost: $2,115,206.

Source: University Medical Center of El Paso.