State Medicaid Programs

Posted on May 25, 2011 by townsend

• GOP: Feds should let states tighten Medicaid eligibility, By Mary Agnes Carey and Phil Galewitz, May 24, 2011, Miami Herald: “With their proposal to turn Medicaid into block grants all but dead, Republicans are pushing legislation to let states tighten eligibility rules for the health program for poor people and those with disabilities. The move, which would affect Medicaid as well as the Children’s Health Insurance Program, would help cash-strapped states save money, but it also could cause hundreds of thousands of people to lose health coverage. While Democrats strenuously oppose the proposed Medicaid change, some advocates and physicians groups worry that the issue could wind up as a bargaining chip in the partisan wrangling over raising the federal debt limit and reducing the budget deficit…”
• Christie eyes curb on Medicaid rolls, By Matt Katz and Maya Rao, May 23, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Gov. Christie plans to seek approval for a proposal that would deny Medicaid coverage to adults in a family of four with an annual household income of little more than $6,000, down from the current $30,000. A single mother raising three children who earned as little as $118 a week would not qualify for the government-funded medical coverage. The eligibility-requirement change, which must be cleared by the Obama administration and would apply only to new adult Medicaid applicants, would follow Christie’s eliminating – for the second year – a long-standing line item that would provide nearly $7.5 million in funding to family-planning clinics…”
• State drops managed-care Medicaid plan for 5 counties, By Charles S. Johnson, May 23, 2011, Billings Gazette: “The Schweitzer administration has abandoned its controversial plan to set up a Medicaid managed-care demonstration project in Lewis and Clark, Cascade, Choteau, Teton and Judith Basin counties. The Gazette State Bureau reported last fall that the Schweitzer administration since August 2009 had discussed using managed-card Medicaid, the state-federal program that provides health care for the poor and disabled. One major proposal came from Centene Corp., a large managed-care firm based in St. Louis. It was based on the idea that the private company would be paid a certain amount of money for each patient and ‘manage’ that patient’s care by directing him or her to lower-cost health care. That, in turn, was supposed to save money for both the state and the company.
  By last week, the state pulled the plug on the idea…”
• U.S. objects to new law on clinics in Indiana, By Robert Pear, May 22, 2011, New York Times: “The Obama administration is raising serious objections to a new Indiana law that cuts off state and federal money for Planned Parenthood clinics providing health care to low-income women on Medicaid. The objections set the stage for a clash between the White House and Gov. Mitch Daniels, a Republican, over an issue that ignites passions in both parties. The changes in Indiana are subject to federal review and approval, and administration officials have made it clear they will not approve the changes in the form adopted by the state. Federal officials have 90 days to act but may feel pressure to act sooner because Indiana is already enforcing its law, which took effect on May 10, and because legislators in other states are working on similar measures…”