SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Assemblymember Rudy Salas and Assemblymember Jim Wood held a joint oversight hearing on Tuesday, April 30 to look into the findings of the State Audit report that found the oversight of the delivery of preventive services to children in Medi-Cal.
Among the findings of the report, it was revealed that an average of 2.4 million children in Medi-Cal per year did not receive all required preventive services and that California’s utilization rate for preventive services has remained below 50 percent and ranked 40th for all states.
“Access to health care providers and preventive services for children in Medi-Cal is severely lacking, especially in rural and other medically underserved communities,” said Assemblymember Salas. “This is unacceptable. Our state prides itself on expanding access to quality, affordable health care, but we are not making the necessary investments or providing adequate oversight and accountability. This audit report has detailed and shown how this issue is affecting children, and now we must follow through on solutions to ensure access to preventive health care for our most vulnerable populations in the most medically underserved areas.”
