States are rethinking Medicaid

As you know, because of the Supreme Court’s Obamacare decision, the Governor’s of Florida and Texas have said they will not expand Medicaid coverage as demanded by Obamacare.  But, that is not the extent of what the states are pondering.

A bit of background is necessary.  The federal government sets the base eligibility requirements for Medicaid.  Any state could, of course, expand those requirements if they chose to do so, and many did.  A little publicized piece of Obamacare prohibited the states from lowering any of their expanded eligibility Medicaid requirements, or risk losing all federal Medicaid funding.

As the Supreme Court’s decision would seem to find said government edict be coercive, and thus unconstitutional, the states are reacting, mostly because many states can no longer afford to cover their expanded eligibility “insureds”.  Currently, the federal government covers about 57% of a state’s Medicaid costs, leaving the state to pay for the rest.

Within hours of the Supreme Court’s decision on June 28, lawyers in the Maine attorney general’s  office began preparing a legal argument to allow health officials to strike more than 20,000 Medicaid recipients from the state’s rolls – including 19 and 20-year-olds – beginning in October to save $10 million by next July.

Alabama and Wisconsin are considering similar plans to reduce their expanded coverage as they can’t afford it either.

Have we promised too much to too many?  Maybe not.

Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told governors in February 2011 that they should look for cuts elsewhere, such as cutting back on benefits. [emphasis supplied]

Is this a peek at this administration’s philosophy?

Everyone has “coverage”, but over time, their insurance “coverage” doesn’t cover anything…because we’re broke.

 

Posted in , ,

SoundOffSister

The Sound Off Sister was an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and special trial attorney for the Department of Justice, Criminal Division; a partner in the Florida law firm of Shutts & Bowen, and an adjunct professor at the University of Miami, School of Law. The Sound Off Sister offers frequent commentary concerning legislation making its way through Congress, including the health reform legislation passed in early 2010.

11 Comments

  1. Lynn on July 12, 2012 at 7:58 am

    As always ?thanks SOS, there was litle coverage of this point. But, I wonder if there was some evidence of fraud in these cases. I surely hope we aren’t going to have states hiring Medicaid Raiders, it would be just like a state government to HIRE more state wokers to save money.



  2. phil on July 12, 2012 at 8:16 am

    We’re out of money?? Time to spend more!



  3. Dimsdale on July 12, 2012 at 8:33 am

    Instead of small laboratories of democracy, some states, particularly those controlled by liberals, are now little representations of Greece.? And Spain. etc.
    ?
    We should learn from the failed states the way we should have learned from a failed Europe.



  4. JBS on July 12, 2012 at 10:33 am

    Gee, it’s kinda like buying health insurance and finding that after the check is cashed, the company doesn’t cover this and partially covers that all with an annual deduction that has a lifetime cap. And on and on . . .
    I talk with people who are (seriously) wondering when their free health care is going to become effective? Somehow the magic year is 2014. I get dirty looks when I tell them that is the year they will have to pay a lot of money to purchase health insurance or pay the fine. They are still convinced that coverage will cost less and, seriously, Obama wouldn’t fine them. LOL
    Our spendthrift governor, Danny P., is going to take the money, drop it into the general fund and the Democrat legislators will devour it like so many vultures on a carcass. The Medicare millions will turn into state union jobs. Poof!
    ?



  5. sammy22 on July 12, 2012 at 11:40 am

    So Maine is going to cut Medicaid recipient roll and “save” $10M. I wonder who is going to pay for the health care services that those 20,000 Medicaid recipients are currently receiving. My guess is that the people w/ healthcare insurance will foot the bill w/ higher premiums. At least the feds have been paying 57%.



  6. dennis on July 12, 2012 at 12:00 pm

    Gee,I wonder who will eventually pay? The 52% that are still paying taxes will pay for their coverage. Here’s a non Liberal Idea why don’t those 20,000 people do what we all do, PAY FOR COVERAGE with our money , not someone elses. Don’t say that they need to have insurance, every hospital in USA has to treat them whether they have insurance or not. Who are the FEDS that pay 57%? Taxpayers duh.



  7. sammy22 on July 12, 2012 at 3:33 pm

    Right on! So what was the point of the post? Maine’s residents will eventually pay one way or another. So all the states who are considering bailing out of the Medicaid expansion will eventually pony-up the money w/ or w/o a contribution from the federal government. Does not sound like what SOS is leading us to think.



  8. DocD on July 12, 2012 at 5:04 pm

    What I don’t understand is why Medicaid recipients have NO obligation to defray even the smallest amount of the cost of the medical services they receive.? Oh wait, I forgot, they do have to pay their cell phone bill each month.
    Seriously, when?families struggle with soaring monthly health care premiums and $45-50 co-pays,?they are forced to cut back in other areas to find the money to pay these additional expenses. Those with medicaid simply show up with their card and receive the same care,?year after year.? And show up they do.? When it’s free (to them)? they are happy to show up at the ER for a non-emergent problem.? Surely a?$5-10 office visit or $25-50 ER visit would not be “unfair”, would it?? Improper ulitilization of ER’s would also drastically be reduced improving emergency service overall.



  9. Lynn on July 14, 2012 at 7:28 am

    Doc D you are right on. Using the ER as an alternative for doctor or outpatient clinics drives our medical costs into the stratosphere. However, I’m not sure how you “retrain” those who have been brought up to always go to the ER for everything. Being the heartless conservative that I am, I would charge people ?$10 – $25 ?everytime they visit the ER for nonemergency issues.?
    ?



  10. sammy22 on July 14, 2012 at 11:55 am

    Gee, you make it sound like going to the ER is some sort of fun, instead of being, for some people, the only place one can go to when one needs care. And what has this to do with Medicaid that has been around since 1965?



square-medicaid

The website's content and articles were migrated to a new framework in October 2023. You may see [shortcodes in brackets] that do not make any sense. Please ignore that stuff. We may fix it at some point, but we do not have the time now.

You'll also note comments migrated over may have misplaced question marks and missing spaces. All comments were migrated, but trackbacks may not show.

The site is not broken.