New Mexico’s medical provider shortage impacting military installations

The Rio Grande Foundation has done tremendous work on New Mexico’s medical provider shortage. It is severe and there are numerous simple solutions that the Legislature and Gov. could and should embrace. Now, the Albuquerque Journal reported this weekend, the medical provider shortage is impacting the State’s ability to attract even members of the military.

A few data points from the piece: At New Mexico’s three Air Force bases — Kirtland in Albuquerque, Cannon near Clovis and Holloman outside of Alamogordo — the lack of specialty medical care is a major deterrent to service members who are assigned there, U.S. Air Force officials said.

One in five airmen assigned to a base in New Mexico must turn down the post because the medical care is not sufficient for a member of their family

Cannon, Kirtland and Holloman rank among the top 17 Air Force bases for medical rejection. The rest of the list is made up mostly of remote locations in less-populous states like North Dakota and Montana.

In other words, a bunch of relatively young, by definition healthy, and active people are unwilling to come to New Mexico due to the medical provider shortage. When will this be a big enough issue for MLG and the Legislature to address?