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Doulas and Medicaid Policy Discussion
Amy Chen and Alexis Robels-Fradet from National Health Law Program (NHeLP) share what states have done so far to incorporate doulas into Medicaid and answer questions about opportunities and challenges ahead. To learn more about the project, visit the Doula Medicaid Project homepage.
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Florida Legislature’s Medicaid Folly
The Florida Legislature is about to make final decisions about the state’s budget in the next few weeks – decisions that are constructed on false fiscal assumptions — with reckless options on the table that would weaken the state’s health care system and lead to more uninsured Floridians if finalized. During what we all hope…
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Biden Administration Must Rise to the Challenge and Protect Migrant Children
Vice President Harris has been tasked with untangling myriad migration challenges at the U.S. southern border, including addressing the root causes of migration from Central America. The list of possible root causes is long, and solving problems such as political instability, violence, deep poverty, and devastation brought on by natural disasters is not going to…
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A Profile of Mississippi’s Low-Wage Uninsured Workers
The recently enacted American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARP) includes new financial incentives for states to extend health insurance coverage to low-wage workers and other adults earning less than $17,775 a year through Medicaid.¹ These incentives apply to regular spending in a state’s Medicaid program and offer a five percent across-the-board increase in the…
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Low-Wage Worker Fact Sheet Methodology
Mississippi Methodology: All Georgetown CCF analysis is derived from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS) data. The data in this report come from two ACS sources: 2019 Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS), a two-thirds sample of the full ACS data file. All data points in this sample were collected in calendar year 2019.…
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Hybrid Approach to Resolving Payment Disputes Breaks Legislative Stalemates Over Balance Billing, How Will the No Surprises Act Affect These New State Laws?
In December 2020, Congress enacted the No Surprises Act, which is designed to protect all Americans from surprise medical bills from out-of-network providers. But many states did not wait for federal action. Seven states enacted new surprise billing laws in 2020; five of these provide comprehensive protections. These laws raised the total number of states with protections to 33, including…
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HHS Secretary Becerra Approves Illinois Waiver Request to Extend Postpartum Medicaid Coverage
New mothers in Illinois will now be able to stay eligible for Medicaid and CHIP coverage for one year after delivery under a Medicaid Section 1115 waiver approved today by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid. The approval allows Illinois to receive federal matching funds for providing an additional 10 months of pregnancy-related Medicaid and…
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Advancing Postpartum Coverage in Medicaid: Waiver or SPA?
The recently enacted American Rescue Plan Act has many new opportunities and important provisions that we are still absorbing and unpacking. One key change, as readers of SayAhh! know, is the new state option to provide 12 months of postpartum Medicaid and CHIP coverage to women after the end of their pregnancy, well beyond the…
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California’s Medicaid Breakthrough: An Opportunity to Advance Children’s Social and Emotional Health
By Sarah Crow and Christina Altmayer Revamping Medicaid policies to improve young children’s social and emotional health and address health care inequities is particularly critical in California, where over half of children ages 0 to 5 have Medicaid coverage (known as Medi-Cal, in California), and two-thirds are children of color. California ranks near the bottom…
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Some States’ Letters to CMS on Medicaid Work Requirements Double Down
Last month, CMS began taking steps to get rid of Medicaid section 1115 work requirement waivers as my colleague Joan Alker has written about. The Biden Administration sent letters to states with approved work requirements that “preliminarily” disapproved the policy on the basis of the COVID-19 pandemic and uncertainty of its aftermath on health and…
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Implementing American Rescue Plan’s 12-month Postpartum Medicaid Coverage: Federal and State Actions
Federal matching funds for the American Rescue Plan Act’s new state Medicaid option to provide 12 full months of postpartum coverage won’t be available *officially* to states until April 2022. (Say Ahhh! Readers know that the Families First Coronavirus Response Act requires states to keep all Medicaid beneficiaries enrolled, including postpartum women, so no coverage…
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Medicaid Wars: Rescind and Withdraw (Episode II)
The Biden Administration has a long list of bad Medicaid policies to unwind. As chronicled in Episode I, the groundwork for the unwinding was laid in a Presidential Executive Order, “Strengthening Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act,” issued on January 28. Among other things, the E.O. directs the Secretary of HHS to review section 1115 demonstrations and…
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Maggie Clark Talks Maternal Health with Marketplace
Listen as Maggie Clark discusses the importance of postpartum Medicaid coverage with Sabri Ben-Achour of Marketplace. Maggie Clark with the Georgetown Center for Children and Families said that “when women lose this coverage after 60 days, about half of them become uninsured. So that’s a million new mothers every year who are losing coverage every…
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House Hearing Will Examine the Looming Fiscal Cliff for Medicaid Programs in the Territories
On Wednesday, March 17, 2021, the Health Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will hold an important hearing on “Averting a Crisis: Protecting Access to Health Care in the U.S. Territories.” In December 2019, Congress provided Puerto Rico and the other territories — American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S.…
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American Rescue Plan is Lifting Children Out of Poverty: Will it Affect Their Medicaid Eligibility?
An extraordinary and historic moment happened last week for children and families when President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan into law. The bill is the 3rd piece of emergency legislation enacted since the advent of the COVID-19 global pandemic, which has upended the country in so many ways. It is hard to imagine that…
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Optional 12 Months Postpartum Medicaid Coverage Leaves Opportunity to do More
Tucked inside the American Rescue Plan signed into law by President Biden last week is a Medicaid state plan option allowing states to offer pregnancy-related Medicaid and CHIP coverage for one year after the end of pregnancy, extending coverage well beyond the current cutoff of 60 days postpartum. The option, which is the result of…
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American Rescue Plan Act Will Strengthen Public and Private Health Insurance
The House and Senate have passed the American Rescue Plan and the President plans to sign it tomorrow bringing critical relief to America’s families. In addition to providing relief to unemployed workers, pulling millions of children and families out of poverty and helping school districts address learning loss, the COVID-19 relief legislation will strengthen both…
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American Rescue Plan Act: Health Coverage Provisions Explained
On March 11, 2021, President Biden will sign into law the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act of 2021 (H.R. 1319). The wide-ranging, critically needed COVID-19 relief legislation includes a number of key provisions that strengthen both public and private health insurance coverage. Some of the new provisions build on actions Congress previously took in earlier…
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Biden Administration Actions on Public Charge Rules Help Restore Hope for Immigrant Families
This week brought some much-needed good news on public charge, which has immigration advocates singing Prince’s classic hit, “1999,” in homage to a return to the longstanding public charge rules also known as the 1999 field guidance. The good news is certainly worthy of a princely celebration, but some may be wondering how we got…
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Too Many Babies Miss Out on Medicaid Infant Coverage, Promising Practices Point the Way for States
By: Kay Johnson For more than 25 years, federal law has guaranteed enrollment for babies born to Medicaid beneficiary mothers, known as deemed newborn coverage, which begins at birth and continues uninterrupted through the first year of life. Passed with bipartisan Congressional support under the Deficit Reduction Act of 1984 (P.L. 98-369), the purpose of…
