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The Philadelphia Inquirer
A new study that projects what could happen if Pennsylvania covered the costly treatment of hepatitis C for everyone in Medicaid yields some surprises for policymakers nationwide: Few lives would be saved. Some patients might actually fare worse. The federal government would likely reap savings, at the expense of the states. The counterintuitive findings from the University of Pittsburgh may become part of pitched debates in state capitols and the incoming administration in Washington over healthcare costs.
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The Hill
While Democrats have been pounding the drum against proposed changes to Medicare, Republicans appear far more likely to pursue an overhaul of Medicaid, the healthcare program for the poor. Medicaid has grown in size in recent years, with Obamacare extending coverage to millions of low-income people who hadn’t qualified before.
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Morning Consult
The Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission is recommending that Congress provide five additional years of funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program next year. The nonpartisan body, which advises Congress on issues affecting Medicaid and CHIP, is urging lawmakers to extend funding for the program through 2022. The CHIP program provides health insurance for children in families whose incomes don't qualify for Medicaid. Extending funding for the program is considered "must-pass legislation" next year by most on Capitol Hill.
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The Hill
A group of Republican chairmen is pressing the Obama administration for answers about Obamacare's Medicaid expansion as the fate of the program is up in the air. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Pennsylvania Reps. Tim Murphy and Joe Pitts on Monday sent a letter raising concerns about federal dollars being "wasted" as part of Obamacare's expansion of Medicaid, the government health insurance program for low-income people.
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Kansas Health Institute
Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback's administration has requested a one-year extension of the current KanCare program while delaying a proposal for an updated version of the Medicaid managed care system. KanCare, which placed all 425,000 Kansans in Medicaid under the administration of three private insurance companies, began in 2013 and is scheduled to expire at the end of 2017.
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Kansas Health Institute
Medicaid expansion will get hearings in the Kansas House during the upcoming legislative session, the chairman of its health committee said, and leadership assignments suggest the issue may have a more receptive audience than in the past. Rep. Dan Hawkins, a Republican who also headed the House Health and Human Services Committee in 2016, said he remains opposed to expanding Medicaid to some low-income non-disabled adults, but his committee will debate the issue.
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Tampa Bay Times
The Florida Senate is starting to consider a new Medicaid system it could put into place if Congress gave the state a block grant and freedom to run the program with limited federal involvement, Senate President Joe Negron said Tuesday. It's a change Negron said he hopes could expand health coverage to more than half a million Floridians caught in the "coverage gap" — people who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to afford health insurance of their own.
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The Columbus Dispatch
With President-elect Donald Trump and congressional Republicans planning to repeal Obamacare, Gov. John Kasich's administration released a report Friday saying that Ohio's 2014 Medicaid expansion has improved the health and reduced financial hardships for hundreds of thousands of poor Ohioans.
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Kaiser Health News
Montana State Senator Ed Buttrey is a no-nonsense businessman from Great Falls. Like a lot of Republicans, he's not a fan of the Affordable Care Act, nor its expansion of Medicaid, the health insurance for the poor and disabled. So Buttrey wrote a Medicaid expansion bill for Montana that linked the health coverage to a job training program. He wanted everyone getting benefits to have to meet with a labor specialist who would help them figure out how to get a job or to get a better paying job.
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Richmond Times-Dispatch
Faced with a budget shortfall now estimated at $1.26 billion, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe and General Assembly Republicans are bickering instead over whether the governor proposed to expand Medicaid in the budget he presented legislators on Friday. McAuliffe did not include $2.4 billion in federal funds that Virginia could use to expand the healthcare program under the Affordable Care Act or an estimated state general fund savings of $213 million that he said could have helped offset spending cuts.
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Arkansas Online
During its final meeting Thursday, which lasted just over 20 minutes, a legislative task force unanimously approved a report recommending steps the state of Arkansas should take to slow the growth of spending in the state's Medicaid program.
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The Hill
Deep-red Arkansas' Medicaid expansion has been a successful model for Republican-led states to follow, but with Obamacare on the chopping block, its future is unclear. While millions of people in the 31 states and the District of Columbia that expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act are at risk of losing coverage if the healthcare law is repealed, Arkansas, and to a lesser extent New Hampshire, face a unique situation.
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Georgia Health News
Kay Rogers suffered from congestive heart failure, a chronic illness that meant eventually she couldn't keep working the same number of hours. She was terminated from her job. Unemployed, uninsured and weakened by a chronic illness, Rogers applied for disability benefits. She was denied. She appealed that decision, but was denied again. Now her illness has progressed so far that she is unable to work a full-time job.
To compound her problems, Rogers, 52, finds herself in what is known as Georgia's "coverage gap," That means she doesn't qualify for Medicaid under the state's current eligibility rules, and she doesn't make enough money to get discounted coverage through the health insurance exchange. So she's left uninsured. Hundreds of thousands of other low-income Georgia adults are in the same predicament.
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Maine Public
Supporters of expanding Medicaid in Maine say they've collected enough signatures to put the issue before the legislature, or the voters. The citizen initiative has the potential to extend health insurance coverage to 70,000 Mainers. But with the future of the Affordable Care Act uncertain under a Donald Trump presidency, it's unclear how and if Medicaid expansion could work, even if it is approved here in Maine.
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