By Alphonse Muhare

(From left to right) Alphonsine, a refugee from Burundi and Behuhuma and Cecile from Congo say they need medicaid to help offset their medical expenses after they have given birth. An African mother has an average of three kids in her marital life.

A small clause in the new Medicaid law is causing widespread outrage. The clause requires that only American citizens who can present their birth certificates to medical providers will receive care.

Cedar Rapids, Iowa. --Medicaid, known also as Title 19, is a federal and state funded program that pays certain medical and health care costs of low-income families. Those who don’t qualify—even though they are here legally—are using words like “disrespectful” and “inhuman.”

“This government is treating us with little regard,” Jamie Shuttles, 41, a mother of seven, said. “We deserve respect. They should ask for our opinions before they make such inhuman laws.”

Shuttles moved to Iowa from New Orleans after the Katrina disaster. She says she struggles to take care of her kids.

“We came in Iowa after we lost everything. To ask for the birth certificates of my children is an insult because our hardships cannot allow us to go back to Louisiana to look for those papers,” she says.

The new Medicaid law has been in effect since July 1, 2006. The Iowa Department of Human Services (DHS), which runs the program, sent notifications to Iowan Medicaid recipients in June asking them to prove their citizenship in order to continue benefiting from medical coverage.

Cedric and Kaya. For being born in USA, refugees' children are automatically qualified to receive medicaid

In an address to some Iowan non-profit organizations, DHS director, Kevin Concannon said he was aware of defects of the new law.

He said it did not make sense for a medical provider to ask for a birth certificate from a patient who has just had a car accident and is unconscious. “It seems that lawmakers did not foresee such an event,” he said.

This law has also angered legal immigrants, mostly African refugees, who were eligible for Medicaid before the new law. “I have no high school diploma. I have no health insurance. I cannot pay all the medical costs of my children. How will we survive in this country?” Said Monica Lwahoshi.

Lwahoshi and her four children escaped war with her children from Africa.

An organization that deals with the welfare of refugees also expressed its protest over the new law. Aime Minega, director of Generation Without Border, Inc., a Cedar Rapids-based, says more than 80% percent of refugees living in Iowa depend on the Medicaid for their health insurance.

“Taking Medicaid away will leave their lives in jeopardy,” he says.

The Cedar Rapids DHS asks, however, those parents who don’t qualify under the new law to buy “cheaper health insurance” from their employers while their American-born children will continue receiving their medical coverage from the government.

Adult refugees meet to discuss how they can use their community spirit to solve their problems arising due to lack of healthcare insurance

“Too good to be true!” Says Minega. “Many of these small companies that employ our people don’t have health insurance to sell.”

Shuttles and other families who reacted to this law say their paychecks are not just enough to pay their rents and utility bills, but they don’t “see even a dime to pay” for their insurance coming from those paychecks. Shuttles say, “We feel crucified! We feel hopeless!”