NEW YORK TIMES: In Pennsylvania, Gov. Tom Wolf, a newly elected Democrat, is scrapping his Republican predecessor’s conservative approach to expanding Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Mr. Wolf said this week that he would instead pursue a straightforward expansion of the government health insurance program for the poor, no longer charging premiums or limiting benefits for some enrollees.
In Tennessee and Wyoming, however, bills to extend Medicaid to far more low-income residents under the law were quashed by Republican legislators last week, despite having the support of the states’ Republican governors. Opponents in both states said that, among other things, they did not believe the federal government would keep its promise of paying at least 90 percent of the cost of expanding the program. It currently pays the full cost, but the law reduces the federal share to 90 percent — a permanent obligation, it says — by 2020. …
These new developments underscore just how complicated the politics of expanding Medicaid have become — and just how different the results of seeking an expansion have been from state to state… (more)
There never is a “straightforward” expansion of Medicaid regardless of which political party is involved.
The criteria to be eligible for Medicaid is ever changing with many technicalities. Poor people are sent on a paper chase trying to prove to caseworkers they meet the financial eligibility for it. At any point when the jumping through the hoops becomes too much the person is denied coverage on technicalities.
In Pennsylvania, applications for children’s health coverage under CHIP were held up with the private provider saying that people were ineligible because they “thought” they would qualify for Medicaid and when the family would apply and go through the tedious eligibility process they would find out 6 months later what they already knew, they didn’t qualify. Result, child who is eligible denied both coverages until 6 months later they re-apply for CHIP.
Pennsylvania has some really serious problems and the people running it’s bureaucracies are one of the biggest problems.
The only safety net in PA is for government employees and elected officials who seem to think they can print money for their own salaries and benefits. Next to last in job growth, decayed infrastructures, population decreasing. The keystone state is more like the millstone state. Our politicians are hung around our necks and we are drowning in a sea of self-serving stupidity.