by Mike Hall, May 12, 2011
The House Republican budget plan would throw as many as 44 million low-income adults and children out of Medicaid over the next 10 years and likely leave them with no health care coverage, according to a new study by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).
Under the House Republican budget plan developed by Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, Medicaid would be converted to a block grant program and the new health care reform law—the Affordable Care Act—would be repealed. That, says the study,
would trigger major reductions in program spending and enrollment compared to current projections, a shift with big implications for states, hospitals and tens of millions of low-income Americans who likely would become uninsured.
Currently, the federal government provides states with about 60 percent of the cost for the low-income health care program. Under the Republican budget, the spending reductions and block grants would cut the federal share to states by about 44 percent.
This reduction could result in large reductions in payments to providers and enrollment. In turn, these reductions would likely worsen the problem of the uninsured and strain the nation’s safety net.
Diane Rowland, executive director of the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, says the Republican budget plan would “substantially reduce states’ ability to provide coverage to low-income Americans.”
The repeal of the [Affordable Care Act], combined with the adoption of the Medicaid block grant, would add millions more to the number of uninsured Americans and compromise Medicaid’s role as the health safety net in the next recession.”
Click here for the full study and here for a fact sheet on the Republican budget plan.
In addition to funding the cuts, the Republican budget lifts current federal Medicaid standards states must meet and would allow each state to design its own program. The result would be a confusing array of 50 different Medicaid programs with varying eligibility requirements and benefit standards.
