NC lawmakers consider undoing regulations that 'ration' where hospitals can build

Fourteen months ago, the North Carolina House of Representatives voted 114-2 to designate the bobcat as the state's official state cat. Now the bobcat bill is a threat to community hospitals, says the N.C. Hospital Association. Not with the bobcat provision - that was deleted from the bill - but with the new text that replaced the bobcat language. The new text was added June 14 and has nothing to do with bobcats. Instead, it would repeal a special health care law that controls where new hospitals, surgical centers, medical scanning clinics, drug rehab centers, hospices and other medical services are placed.