 "Photo: Courtesy of UH-M?noa")
College students aren't known for maintaining healthy lifestyles. Instead, they're famous for parties, promiscuity and procrastination. Though such activities may be symptomatic of a university's vibrant social scene, their cost to a school's medical staff is significant. Thankfully, the University of Hawai‘i Board of Regents has acknowledged this fact of campus life by voting to elevate funding for UH's health center.
Last month, the regents approved a plan to increase UH's student health fee over a five-year period, nearly quadrupling the charge from $17.50 to $68 per semester. The fee would increase by $10.50, to $28, for the upcoming fall semester and $10 for each subsequent year until 2013.
Summer session fees would also increase by $4 per year over the same timeframe, with the cost to students soaring from $6 per summer session to a total of $26.
While some students feel that the fee increase is an unnecessary financial encumbrance, the university's primary health services facility, University Health Services at Mānoa, is facing fiscal shortfalls that could jeopardize existing levels of medical care, eventually leading to a reduction in services. Since 1995, when the student health fee was implemented, university funding for health services has been reduced from 80 percent of UHSM's operating budget to less than 14 percent.
Furthermore, the approximately $10 co-payment assumed by students for each visit covers only 38 percent of UHSM's annual budget, with another 27 percent currently coming from the student health fee. When coupled with a 25 percent increase in the utilization rates for the health center's medical clinics, pharmacy and clinical laboratory, these numbers point toward an income gap that's projected to expand over the next three years.
Granted, the health center could spur revenue generation by raising fee-for-service charges. Such a move countervails UHSM's mission, however, by placing the cost of medical care outside the range of some students' bank accounts. Many members of the university community don't have medical insurance, making UHSM their sole source of affordable health care.
In 2007, a survey of health fees at competing institutions reported fees ranging from $45 to well over $200, with the national average hovering around $105 (the average for peer institutions was slightly higher, at $121.39). By comparison, UH's current health fee ranks as one of the lowest in the country.
Contrary to most students' cheaper-than-thou-art lifestyles, a student health fee survey conducted last November found that 83 percent of respondents were amenable to the proposed fee increase. Both the Graduate Student Organization and the Student Health Advisory Council backed the fee increase prior to the regents' vote, though the Associated Students of the University of Hawai‘i, UH's undergraduate student government assembly, withheld its support.
With residential tuition prices climbing above $3,000 and gas guzzling another $4 per gallon out of students' wallets, opposition to the fee increase would be understandable. Amplified revenue should translate into improved treatment, however, including the provision of after-hours services, subsidized immunizations, updated data management systems and expanded mental health programs.
Yes, the cost of learning is outpacing the cost of living. But that's the price of pulling all-nighters in paradise. If you're feeling sad about having to shell out more cash for your education, you can always drown your sorrows in an ice cold six-pack. Just remember to raise a glass to the Board of Regents, who made sure that the cure for your hangover would be available when you most need it.
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