Waivers
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Rural Hospital Closures: Tracking Tool Shows Impact in States Reluctant to Expand Medicaid
At the University of North Carolina’s Rural Health Research Program, Director Mark Holmes and colleagues are tracking the increasing numbers of rural hospital closures across the United States with this dynamic map. As part of this work the Rural Health program has also looked at the impact on rural populations nationwide of state decisions not…
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Tracking Medicaid Enrollment and Spending
By Joe Touschner Each year, the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured reports on the findings from its survey of budgets and enrollment among state Medicaid programs. (The budget survey is not to be confused with the Kaiser-Georgetown CCF survey of Medicaid and CHIP eligibility and enrollment policies coming in January). This year’s edition…
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States Putting In Place Delayed Medicaid Expansions Must Make Good Faith Effort to Ensure Nobody is Left Behind
Federal approval last month of Pennsylvania’s new plan to expand Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) on January 1, 2015 has brought urgency to this obscure but important issue. States that decide to expand Medicaid where the date of expansion occurs after the original January 1, 2014 ACA Medicaid and health marketplace start…
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Wisconsin Loses Out on At Least $300 Million Due to Governor’s Badgercare Decision
Wisconsin is the only state in the nation to have gone down a very shortsighted and bizarre path with respect to the Medicaid expansion – one that has resulted in serious fiscal challenges for the state. So what did Wisconsin do? Well, in an attempt to “stick it to the man”, Governor Walker said no…
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Public Comments on Indiana’s HIP 2.0 Medicaid Expansion Proposal Submitted!
For those of you interested in the nitty gritty around pending Medicaid Section 1115 waiver proposals we have some more reading material for you. Last night was the deadline for submitting public comments to federal CMS on Indiana’s pending HIP 2.0 proposal. It’s good news that Indiana is serious about accepting the federal funds and…
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Medicaid expansion and the “policy window of opportunity”
Recently I wrote here about the changing political and policy climate around Medicaid expansion and Dr. Liane Wong followed up with an overview of the role of child advocates in working around the same issue, highlighting a report by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Dr. Wong’s piece reminded me of some basic theory any…
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Advocating for Children’s Coverage Under the Medicaid Expansion Option
By Dr. Liane Wong, Health Leader and Program Officer, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation For those up-to-date Say Ahhh! readers, Adam Searing recently wrote about the more compelling reasons – namely $423.6 billion federal dollars plus billions of uncompensated care funds to hospitals – why it’s getting much harder for Governors to turn down Medicaid…
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Medicaid Expansion Tipping Point: The three reasons why reluctant states like Pennsylvania are warming up to Medicaid
It’s getting harder and harder for Governors to say no to the great deal being offered to them through the Medicaid expansion option. Just last week Pennsylvania reached agreement with the federal government on a Medicaid expansion waiver and news stories show possible movement in Wyoming, Utah and Tennessee. This new momentum forward shows that…
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Pennsylvania Becomes 28th State to Expand Medicaid, Governor Compromises on Many of His Requests….
As readers of Say Ahhh! know, we have been closely watching the path of Governor Corbett’s proposal for Pennsylvania Medicaid expansion known as “Healthy PA.” Today, the governor received official approval for his Medicaid Section 1115 Research and Demonstration proposal. Pennsylvania becomes the 28th state (including DC) to expand Medicaid. I have blogged previously about…
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How Does Coverage Gap Impact Parents and Kids in States Turning Down Medicaid Expansion Funds?
We know that thanks to Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, America’s children are – overall – benefiting from historically high rates of health coverage (over 90% of U.S. children are now covered) even through some states still lag behind. However, low-income parents of dependent children around the country are not so fortunate if…
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Urban Institute/RWJF Report: Reluctant States not Expanding Medicaid Hurt State Budgets, Hospitals and Uninsured
A new report from the Urban Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation lays out in detail the consequences to the twenty-four states so far not expanding Medicaid. Earlier analyses have detailed some of the financial hit states take by refusing the new federal Medicaid funding, but this new report takes a much more comprehensive…
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Don’t Forget this Chart When Reading About Ambitious State Medicaid Expansion and Reform Plans
As states move to expand Medicaid across the country, there is plenty of discussion about new and innovative ways to run state Medicaid programs. There is merit (and perhaps cost savings) in trying out new ways to coordinate and deliver care in our health system. In fact, more federal funding was announced last week to…
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Indiana Medicaid Expansion Waiver Not Yet Open for Public Comment
The federal government did not certify Indiana’s Section 1115 Medicaid Research and Demonstration waiver to expand its Healthy Indiana program as complete and open for public comment because the state did not conduct the required tribal consultation with the Potowatomi Indians. The waiver request can be seen here. We along with our partners at the…
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Utah: Medicaid Expansion Report Presented to Legislative Health Reform Task Force
Presented to the Health Reform Task Force of the Utah legislature today the report, by Dr. Norman J. Waitzman of the University of Utah Department of Economics, gives extensive information about the people who would benefit should Utah decide to accept federal money to extend health coverage to low-income people in the state. Surprisingly, the Waitzman…
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Two Americas: Hospitals, Charity Care and Medicaid Expansion
As we move halfway through 2014, rapid changes in how health care is being delivered to our lowest income families are taking place across the country. As I noted last week multiple surveys are showing a significant drop in the rate of uninsured adults nationwide, with most of the reduction coming in states that have…
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Why Editorial Boards Continue to Show Strong Support for Medicaid Expansion
Today and over the holiday weekend in states that have so far refused the federal money available for expanding Medicaid, news outlets continue to editorialize in favor of expansion. In Pennsylvania, The Scranton Times-Tribune decried the decision by the Governor and legislature to go home without either passing a budget or expanding Medicaid to 300,000…
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A Closer Look at the Medicaid Coverage Gap: Most Work, Many in Rural Areas
While a majority of states have accepted federal money to expand health coverage to their lowest-income citizens, many states are still declining funding available under the Affordable Care Act. Reports based on recent federal census data from these states show that most people who would finally gain affordable coverage if Medicaid were expanded are working…
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From Oklahoma: Mercy Health System Lay-Offs Mainly Due to States’ Failure to Expand Medicaid
The Oklahoman reported this week that Mercy, the sixth-largest Catholic health care system in the US, would be laying off hundreds of employees. Mercy said the “lack of Medicaid expansion in most of the states we serve” was a primary reason for the layoffs. The other states affected by Mercy’s decision include Arkansas (where Medicaid…
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HIP 2.0 – Indiana’s Version of Medicaid Expansion
(Another chapter in the unfolding saga of Round 2 of Medicaid expansion, which I call “from simplicity to complexity”.) A few weeks ago I blogged about Governor Pence’s announcement of his intention to submit a waiver request to expand his Medicaid program using “Healthy Indiana 2.0” as a starting point. The state is currently taking…
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Oklahoma Musicians: Stand (Let Your Voice Be Heard) on Expanding Medicaid (Video)
Last week, a group of talented musicians in Oklahoma released a powerful recording about the need to fill the massive gap in health care coverage in their state. (Hat tip: OK Policy Institute.) Noting that over 650,000 state residents – including many professional musicians – do not have health coverage despite working at one or…