Agricultural Pollution Blamed for Toledo Water Contamination

The toxins that contaminated the water supply of the city of Toledo – leaving 400,000 people without access to safe drinking water for two days – were produced by a massive algae boom. But this is not a natural disaster.

Water problems in the Great Lakes – the world’s largest freshwater system – have spiked in the last threeA sample glass of Lake Erie water is extracted near the City of Toledo water intake crib on Sunday. Photograph: Haraz N Ghanbari/AP years, largely because of agricultural pollution. Toledo draws its drinking water from Lake Erie.

Residents were warned not to drink the water on Saturday, after inspectors at the city’s water treatment plant detected the toxin known as microcystin. The toxin is produced by microcystis, a harmful blue-green algae; it causes skin rashes and may result in vomiting and liver damage if ingested. It has been known to kill dogs and other animals and boiling the water does not fix the problem; it only concentrates the toxin.

An official said Sunday Anderson's water issues are not related. 

"(It's) a different algae species," said Executive Director, Anderson Regional Joint Water System Scott Willett. "Though it doesn't seem like it, we are lucky."

The current bloom of microcystis is concentrated in Maumee Bay in Lake Erie’s western basin, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). A second, smaller bloom has appeared in Sandusky Bay.

The main cause for such algal blooms is an overload of phosphorus, which washes into lakes from commercial fertiliser used by farming operations as well as urban water-treatment centres. Hotter and longer summers also promote the spread of the blue-green scum.

The US government banned phosphorus in laundry detergents in 1988. That stopped the algal blooms for some time. But they came back to the Great Lakes in force in 2011 – forming a green scum that covered 5,000 square kilometres (1,900 sq miles) of water at its biggest extent – in the worst algal bloom in recorded history.

Scientists attribute the comeback in large part to changes in farming practices, including larger farms and different fertiliser practices, which send heavier loads of phosphorus into the lakes.

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Council to Look at County Zoning Issues Tuesday

Anderson County Council will look at a number of zoning issues in the county as part of the regular meeting Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. in the historic courthouse downtown.

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Tropical Storm Expected to Miss Mainland

Tropical Storm Bertha has emerged from the eastern Dominican Republic, where it dropped rain but officials say they have no reports of damage.

As it heads for the Turks and Caicos (KAY'-kohs), the storm's maximum sustained winds have dropped slightly to 45 mph.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami says Bertha is likely to curve to the northeast and move parallel to the eastern seaboard without hitting the U.S. mainland.

Anderson Water Problem Not Same as in Toledo

A toxin discovered in a northwestern Ohio treatment plant left 400,000 people without drinkable tap water for a second day Sunday.

Residents of Toledo, its suburbs and small areas of southeastern Michigan began lining up for water after news of the contamination surfaced Saturday. Ohio Gov. John Kasich declared a state of emergency for Lucas, Wood and Fulton counties and deployed the National Guard to get water and meals ready to eat, or MREs, to the area.

"(It's) a different algae species," said Executive Director, Anderson Regional Joint Water System Scott Willett. "Though it doesn't seem like it, we are lucky."

The algae in which continues to cause taste and odor issues in Anderson's water does not contain the same substance which has shut down Toledo's water supply.

"What's more important than water? Water's about life," Kasich said. "We know it's difficult. We know it's frustrating."

The governor said it was too early to say how long the water advisory will last or what caused toxins to spike suddenly in the drinking water.

"We don't really want to speculate on this," Kasich said. "When it comes to this water, we've got be very careful."

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House Oks Border Bill; Senate Passage Unlikely

In an attempt to weigh in on an immigration issue before Congress leaves Washington for a five-week break, the House has voted 223-189 to approve a $694 million emergency funding bill. The Republican-backed legislation is a response to the rising number of minors who have crossed the U.S. border unaccompanied and without going through the necessary legal steps.

The Border Security Supplemental Spending Bill was endorsed one day after the House Republican leadership canceled its plan to hold a vote on the legislation. The bill is not expected to have a chance of passage in the Senate, which didn't approve a different version of similar legislation before it left for an end-of-summer break.

As we reported Thursday, the bill would boost "funding for overwhelmed border agencies, add immigration judges and detention space, send National Guard troops to the border, and change the law so that the youths can be sent home quickly without deportation hearings that are now guaranteed, according to The Associated Press."

Also on Friday, the House voted 216-192 to end the president's deportation relief program. The Deferred Action for Child Arrivals program gives officials discretion to defer the deportation of people who entered the U.S. illegally before they turned 16.

The votes came hours after President Obama criticized Congress for not acting on immigration and other issues he said need to be dealt with to help America's economy continue to improve.

State: S.C. Waits on Impact of Court/Obamacare Subsidies

South Carolina hospital executives these days are like football coaches at halftime, making changes based on what the opposition threw at them in the first half while trying to anticipate the different tactics they might face in the second half.

They aren’t the only ones.

Conflicting federal appeals court rulings last month — one said insurance subsidies are unconstitutional in states that don’t run their own exchanges; another said the subsidies are permitted — could have even more impact on South Carolinians who bought health insurance policies through the Affordable Care Act.

The legal challenges likely are heading to the Supreme Court, leaving up in the air whether millions of people nationwide, and tens of thousands in South Carolina, could lose their new health insurance next year.

Uncertainty in health care budgeting isn’t unusual, but with the ever-changing rules under the ACA, “it has escalated,” said Pam Gallagher, chief financial officer of Columbia’s Providence Hospitals. “Everybody’s looking for that magic potion, but the key is you have to be flexible.”

Up to 70,000 lose coverage?

About 118,000 South Carolinians signed up for insurance through the federal marketplace, which operated in the Palmetto State because the state declined to start its own insurance exchange. But only about 85,000 of those South Carolinians paid their first premium, according to the state Department of Insurance.

More than 90 percent of the policies sold in South Carolina were subsidized by tax credits. If the Supreme Court rules those tax credits — given to low-income buyers — are unconstitutional, most of those policyholders are likely to lose their insurance because they won’t be able to afford to pay the full cost for the policies.

The S.C. Hospital Association estimates ending the subsidies could result in from 60,000 to 70,000 South Carolinians losing their insurance coverage.

Removing those people from the insurance market will have an impact on hospitals’ bottom line, but it should be minimal.

“We know that — particularly, in the environment we have now — we could have significant changes,” said Paul Duane, chief financial officer at Palmetto Health. “It’s not about how you budget for it. It’s how you react to it — how nimble you can be.

“You go back. You renegotiate contracts. You manage costs. There have been challenges before, but not of this magnitude.”

In recent years, hospital planners have dealt with major changes in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements.

Those changes have meant hospitals do more day-to-day planning and less planning a year out, Gallagher said.

“A certain procedure will one day be inpatient and the next day outpatient,” she said. “But it’s still the same patient.”

Medicaid funding still key

Hospital leaders say they can deal with the small changes.

What they really want is one big change.

But there’s no indication South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley will back down from her pledge to turn down the federal government’s offer of expanded Medicaid funding for the state.

Haley’s Democratic opponent in November’s election, state Sen. Vincent Sheheen, has said he favors expanding Medicaid so long as the federal government pays 100 percent of the cost. But, in heavily GOP South Carolina, Republican Haley is favored to win re-election.

Expanding Medicaid would provide health insurance to more than 300,000 low-income South Carolinians.

When the ACA was being written, the American Hospital Association agreed that hospitals would accept reduced Medicare payments in return for an expansion of Medicaid. The premise was that hospitals, which legally can’t turn away patients, would save money with fewer uninsured patients.

Now, however, S.C. hospitals face the prospect of lower Medicare payments without any increase in Medicaid to cover the costs of low-income patients.

John Miller, chief executive of AnMed Health in Anderson, said turning down the Medicaid expansion created “a perfect storm” for S.C. hospitals.

“We have this one part that we have absolute certainty about, which is the Medicare cuts,” Miller said. “And we have this huge question mark as to when all of this is said and done politically, legally and otherwise: How many people — who were uninsured out of that 55 million (nationally) when the ACA was passed — are actually going to have insurance?”

As for the thousands of South Carolinians who bought coverage on the new insurance marketplace this year, AnMed has yet to see “any statistical change in either charity or bad debt from the activity that happened on the exchanges,” Miller said.

Considering that, the outcome of the Supreme Court ruling on subsidies might be no more than a burp in the hospital budgeting process.

“It is not the driving issue,” Miller said. “The driving issue for us is Medicaid expansion.”

G News: Sheehen Says S.C. Should Wait on Gay Marriage

State Sen. Vincent Sheheen, the Democratic nominee for governor, says the state should "pause" any battle over its gay marriage ban until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on the issue.

The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers several states including South Carolina, has ruled that Virginia's ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional, following a string of similar rulings in other states.

Gov. Nikki Haley and S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson have defended the state's law. Tom Ervin, an independent running for governor, said after the ruling that the government shouldn't get involved in the issue, which he said should be left to churches and couples.

Sheheen initially said he was monitoring the legal battle over the issue but now says the state should wait until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on it.

"The U.S. Supreme Court will ultimately decide this issue, and our state should pause in the legal battles and await a decision by the court," he said.

"When that decision is given, we must come together and abide by the law of the land, and regardless of the outcome churches must always maintain their ability to determine what ceremonies they conduct and recognize."

Sheheen said he personally doesn't support gay marriage.

Anderson County Taking Accomodations Tax Grant Applications

The 2014-2015 Anderson County Accommodations Tax Grant Applications are now available at the Anderson County Parks, Recreation & Tourism Division located at 101 South Main Street, Room 11, Anderson,  SC 29624. Applications are also online at http://www.andersoncountysc.org/forms/ATAX_application14-15.pdf  Applications are due on August 22 at 4 p.m. 

"God Gap" Between GOP, Democrats Important

The so-called "God Gap" between Republicans and Democrats continues to play an important role in partisan differences, according to a new Gallup poll.

Among very religious Americans, about half, 49 percent, identify as Republican or are likely to vote Republican. Among nonreligious Americans, also about half, 52 percent, identify as Democrats or are likely to vote for Democrats.

This God gap, sometimes called the "religious participation gap," has characterized party politics in the United States for at least the seven years that Gallup has been measuring it, Frank Newport, editor in chief for Gallup.

Religiosity was measured using two survey questions. One asked respondents how important religion is in their daily lives. The other asked how often they attend religious services. With the answers, Gallup created a three category classification — very religious, moderately religious and nonreligious.

Among the moderately religious, a plurality, 44 percent, supported the Democrats while 38 percent supported Republicans. Independents comprised a slightly greater proportion of the nonreligious, 15 percent, than the religious, 11 percent.

Looking at race and ethnicity, the God Gap persisted among whites, Latinos and Asians, but not among blacks. Blacks showed strong support for Democrats, about 75 percent, regardless of their level of religiosity.

"From a practical politics standpoint," Newport wrote, "Republicans face the challenge of expanding their party's appeal beyond the minority of Americans who are very religious, and appealing to Hispanics and Asians given that even the most religious of these growing groups tilt Democratic, albeit not as much as others in these groups who are less religious. Democrats face the challenge of attempting to broaden their party's appeal beyond the base of those who are moderately or nonreligious, a tactic that most likely will require effort to frame the party's positions on social justice and equality issues in a way that is compatible with a high degree of religiousness."

The poll of 87,023 American adults was taken from January to June. The margin of error is plus or minus one percentage point.

Tropical Storm Bertha Nears Barbados

Tropical Storm Bertha has formed, becoming the second named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season.

Tropical storm warnings have been issued for Puerto Rico, the U.S. and British Virgin Islands and other nearby islands.

The U.S. Hurricane Center in Miami said the tropical storm's maximum sustained winds Friday morning were near 45 mph, with no significant change in strength expected over the next two days.

Bertha is centered about 170 miles east of Barbados and is moving west-northwest near 20 mph.

In addition to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, tropical storm warnings are in effect for Babados, St. Lucia, Dominica, Vieques and Culebra. A tropical storm watch is in effect for St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Bertha was expected to pass near Barbados on Friday afternoon and travel through the central Lesser Antilles on Friday evening.

S.C. Awarded $1 Million for Mental Health Services

The Federal Department of Health & Human Services announced today an award of $1,000,000 to the state of South Carolina to fund mental health services.

The million dollar award, announced today by Heath and Human Services Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell, comes from Affordable Care Act funding, and will support four health centers in South Carolina for the expansion or establishment of behavioral health services.

Currently there are nearly 20 health centers operating 165 locations to provide mental health services for over 315,000 South Carolina residents.

The Affordable Care Act is nationally funding 221 health centers with fiscal awards totaling $54.6 million. More than 450,000 people around the country are in need of behavioral services, substance use disorder, and mental health services.

Nationwide, health centers saw more than 1.2 million behavioral health patients in 2013, and the South Carolina health centers treated over 12,000 behavioral health patients.

HHS says the ultimate goal is to give Americans additional opportunities to access high quality care. The Affordable Care Act expanded mental health and substance use disorder benefits for approximately 60 million nationwide, including over 866,000 South Carolinians.

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Most States Not Paying Required Doctors' Medicaid Increases

Just six states and the District of Columbia will use their own money in 2015 to sustain the federal Medicaid pay raise to primary care doctors, which was a key provision of the Affordable Care Act intended to make sure millions of low-income people enrolling in the expanding insurance program have access to a physician.

Interestingly, two of the states extending the pay raise are Alabama and Mississippi -- neither of which expanded Medicaid under the health law. The other states extending the pay raise next year are Colorado, New Mexico, Iowa, and Maryland, according to interviews with state officials and the American Medical Association. Those four states expanded their Medicaid eligibility to cover everyone with incomes less than 138% of the federal poverty level, or about $15,900 for an individual.

Alaska and North Dakota paid primary care doctors in Medicaid the higher rates even before the health law's provision took effect in 2013.

The other 42 states will let the Medicaid pay rates revert back to their 2012 levels.

Under the law, Medicaid fees for primary care increased in 2013 and 2014 to the same amount paid under Medicare. While Medicaid fees vary by state, the change meant an average 73% pay increase nationally, according to a 2012 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Urban Institute. (Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the foundation.)

Nationally, it's unclear whether the higher fees attracted more doctors into Medicaid or made doctors more willing to treat more Medicaid patients. The Obama administration is not collecting any data to show the impact of the higher fees, said a spokeswoman for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. State Medicaid officials also have not studied the impact.

For years, some states have struggled to attract doctors to Medicaid, largely because of their low pay. About 69% of doctors nationally accept new Medicaid patients, but the rate varies widely across the country, according to a study published in 2012 in the journal Health Affairs. New Jersey had the nation's lowest rate at 40%, while Wyoming had the highest, at 99%, according to a survey of doctors by the CDC.

Physician groups, while pleased with the extra funding, have said for years that the 2-year cap would limit its impact on persuading more doctors to treat Medicaid patients. Still, they worry about what happens when the short-lived pay raise goes away in most states.

U.S. House GOP Stung by Border Bill Defeat

Facing a rebellion among their most conservative ranks, House Republicans were forced on Thursday to scuttle an emergency spending measure to address the surge of young Central American migrants at the southern border, in a major embarrassment to the new leadership team.

House Republicans, who have long called for strengthening security at the nation’s southern border, are now forced to head home for the five-week August recess with nothing to show for their efforts — something many Republicans fear will be an enormous political liability.

The blow to Speaker John A. Boehner and his new team — including Representatives Kevin McCarthy of California, the new majority leader, and Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the whip — ensures that no legislation to address what both Democrats and Republicans call an urgent humanitarian crisis will reach President Obama’s desk before the August break. The Senate was also unlikely to pass its own border bill on Thursday.

The failure of even the most modest of Republican border bills also underscored how the prospects of a broad immigration overhaul — which at the beginning of the 113th Congress looked as if it could be the only real legislative achievement of the session — have ground to a final crushing halt amid more than a year of congressional infighting and dysfunction. On the Senate side, Democrats were expected to face a similar blow, as they were unlikely to clear a final procedural hurdle on their $2.7 billion immigration bill.

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