Eligibility & Enrollment
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Another ACA Double Win for States and Families: Aligning Medicaid Coverage for Children of All Ages
Imagine you’re a parent with a pre-schooler and a 9 year-old child, earn $20,000 a year (105% FPL) and live in Georgia. Your younger child qualifies for Medicaid coverage but has to renew coverage every six months. Your older child qualifies for CHIP coverage with a monthly premium of $10 but only has to renew…
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Oral Health: It’s time to put the mouth back in the body
By Tara Mancini Yes, it is time to put the mouth back in the body. This paraphrases comments of Dr. Greg Nycz, a panelist at Kaiser Family Foundation’s screening earlier this summer of the PBS FRONTLINE documentary “Dollars and Dentists.” The film takes a hard look at the nation’s flawed dental care system, highlighting the…
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ACA To Keep Foster Care Youth Covered As They Transition to Adulthood
Young adults have historically been among the demographic groups with the highest rates of uninsurance. Many of these young adults are just joining the workforce and are unable to secure jobs with health benefits. In fact, nearly two out of five young adults ages 19 to 29 were without health insurance in 2011, with those…
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New Study Suggests that Expanding Medicaid Coverage Can Save Lives
By Tara Mancini A new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine adds to the relatively sparse body of knowledge regarding the impact of Medicaid on adults’ health. Researchers looked at three states, Maine, New York, and Arizona that made Medicaid available to childless adults between 2000 and 2005 and found a net decrease…
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How States Transition to New Medicaid Income Standards Could Impact Coverage for Kids and Families
By Martha Heberlein The ACA established a new Modified Adjusted Gross Income (MAGI) standard that will be used to determine income eligibility in Medicaid, CHIP, and for premium tax credits. Under this new approach, states are required to convert their existing Medicaid and CHIP eligibility standards to account for the elimination of income disregards and…
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More Uninsured Likely Following the Supreme Court Decision
By Martha Heberlein I’m not quite sure what it says about me, but I was eagerly checking the Congressional Budget Office’s website yesterday at 2pm awaiting the updated score of the ACA following the Supreme Court ruling. While they’re only estimates, CBO is the official arbiter in DC and their assessments carry a whole lot…
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Foster Care Children and the Affordable Care Act – New Report from CCF and Community Catalyst
In a new analysis, Georgetown’s Center for Children and Families and Community Catalyst, take a look at key provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that hold the promise of improving the health and well-being of the nation’s foster care children and youth. According to government statistics, there were more than 400,000 children and youth…
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Expanding Coverage for Parents Helps Children: Children’s Groups Have a Key Role in Urging States to Move Forward and Expand Medicaid
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) expanded Medicaid coverage to include parents and low-income adults with incomes up to 133 percent of the poverty line. The Supreme Court’s decision means states can now decide whether or not to implement this expansion. Covering low-income parents is important for children: covering parents means that more eligible children will…
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It’s Decision Time for States – Do you Know Where Your Children Are?
By Catherine Hess, NASHP As the National Academy for State Health Policy’s (NASHP) recent webinars The Future of CHIP and Children’s Coverage and Keeping a Focus on Children in Health Care Reform conveyed, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) includes boosts for children’s coverage but raises myriad questions and issues. The country has achieved tremendous progress in reducing the uninsured…
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Child Welfare and the Affordable Care Act: Key Provisions for Children and Youth in the Foster Care System
The Affordable Care Act will have important implications for many of the nation’s children, but, it may prove particularly significant for the over 400,000 children and youth who are part of the foster care system. This issue brief reviews ACA provisions that hold promise of improving the health and well-being of these children, who often…
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CBPP’s New Toolkit Will Help States Prepare for Eligibility Changes Under Health Reform
By Shelby Gonzales, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities There’s a lot to look forward to as states prepare for health reform. Not only will millions of low- and moderate-income people gain access to affordable health coverage, but new systems and processes will make it easier for people to apply for and renew Medicaid and…
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Medicaid Coverage for Parents under the Affordable Care Act – State Fact Sheets
This issue brief presents national estimates of the number and characteristics of uninsured parents who would be eligible for Medicaid in 2014 according to whether they have child who is currently enrolled in Medicaid/CHIP coverage or an uninsured child who is eligible for Medicaid/CHIP but not enrolled. State-specific data are also provided on the ten…
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Medicaid Coverage for Parents under the Affordable Care Act
This issue brief presents national estimates of the number and characteristics of uninsured parents who would be eligible for Medicaid in 2014 according to whether they have child who is currently enrolled in Medicaid/CHIP coverage or an uninsured child who is eligible for Medicaid/CHIP but not enrolled. State-specific data are also provided on the ten…
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IRS Releases Final Premium Tax Credit Rule
By Martha Heberlein The final premium tax credit rule was published in the Federal Register on May 23rd. The rule, which describes eligibility for the health insurance premium tax credits, pretty much finalized what was proposed back in August. (For a summary on the math behind the calculations, check out HealthReformGPS.) However, there are a few interesting things…
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Sequestration Replacement Cuts Could Unravel the Country’s Success in Covering Children
The House Energy and Commerce Committee, charged with finding offsets to avoid reductions to defense spending, has passed a package of cuts totaling $113 billion. The package includes the elimination of two provisions that have helped to drive down the number of uninsured children to the lowest level on record: 1) repeal of the stability…
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89,000 Pennsylvania Children Lose Medicaid Due to Shortsighted Policies & Bureaucratic Backlogs
By George Hoover, Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children Having dedicated my career to making health care coverage accessible to all Pennsylvanians, I am dismayed over recent actions by the state that are jeopardizing health care access for children. The number of Pennsylvania children covered through Medicaid has plummeted by about 89,000 in recent months, including many…
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A Question of Priorities
By Martha Heberlein As the Energy and Commerce Committee searches for options to save the Department of Defense from cuts, coverage for millions of children, parents, pregnant women, the elderly, and people with disabilities could end up on the chopping block. This is just one of a number of distressing offsets that also includes repealing…
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Medicaid Enrollment Slows While State Revenues Steadily Increase
By Tara Mancini It’s true of most states that Medicaid enrollment has slowed and state revenues are steadily increasing. Yet, as governor’s prepared their budgets for fiscal year 2013, enough uncertainty lingered that when budgeting for Medicaid, there continued to be a focus on cost containment. Key findings from the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and…
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Continuous Coverage – Critical for Chronic Conditions
By Tara Mancini Our Say Ahhh! audience is certainly aware of the benefits of implementing continuous coverage, namely, how it can improve health outcomes for beneficiaries while also decreasing administrative and utilization costs. As of January 1, 2012, 28 states offer 12-month continuous eligibility in their CHIP programs (23 in Medicaid). Alabama is one of…