FierceHealthcare

By: Leslie Small

In its short-term appropriations bill, Congress has included a provision aimed at helping states keep their Children’s Health Insurance Programs afloat while lawmakers try to pass a longer-term measure. But that gesture may not go nearly far enough.

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The center’s executive director, Joan Alker, also isn’t impressed by the CHIP provision in the short-term appropriations bill, calling it a sign Congress is trying to “kick the can down the road.” “The longer Congress postpones action on long-term CHIP funding, the more states will be forced to waste time and money developing contingency plans,” she wrote in a blog post, adding, “the more states that send out notices, the more likely it will be that some kids will fall through the cracks.”

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