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State Government's Deadbeat Status Nearly Results In Death Of Baby Boy

(CBS) – Illinois state government's failure to pay its bills almost resulted in the death of a one-year-old boy named Kobe.

State employee Kenea Williams, who works at the Murray Center in Centralia, told an Illinois House panel that her baby's oxygen tank was almost repossessed, until she was able to change providers.

"On Jan. 10, I looked out my front door, and saw the Byrd-Watson medical supply truck," Williams said. "The company had come to repossess Kobe's oxygen homefill system that was keeping him alive."

That's the company which sent police to Williams' door, trying to get its oxygen tank back -- from a little boy whose lungs don't work.

Williams says she has since found another company -- one better equipped to both keep Kobe alive and put up with the state's late payments.

That's Lincare of Effingham, about 50 miles from Williams' home in Odin.

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