Medicaid

Medicaid Coverage “Cliff” Poses Threat to Low-Income Medicare Beneficiaries

Nearly one-third of Medicare beneficiaries do not meet the criteria for Medicaid eligibility but have so little income that they are unlikely to be able to afford their share of their Medicare costs, such as co-pays and deductibles. This is known as the “Medicaid coverage cliff,” and Becker’s Hospital Review, drawing from a recent study published in the journal Health Affairs, takes a brief look at what the Medicaid cliff is and how it may affect the well-being of those affected by this cliff. Learn more in the Becker’s Hospital Review article “5 things to know about the Medicaid coverage [...]

iqtsupport2021-04-16T06:00:43-04:00April 16, 2021|Medicaid, Medicare|

Federal Health Policy Update for Wednesday, April 14

The following is the latest health policy news from the federal government as of 2:45 p.m. on Wednesday, April 14. Temporary Halt to Use of the Johnson & Johnson Janssen Vaccine The White House held a press briefing on Tuesday, April 13 during which the White House press secretary, its COVID-19 response coordinator, and Dr. Anthony Fauci discussed the decision to halt administration of the Johnson & Johnson (Janssen) vaccine until its safety can be further examined. Learn more from a transcript of that briefing. Representatives of the FDA and CDC briefed the news media on the situation involving the [...]

iqtsupport2021-04-14T17:11:09-04:00April 14, 2021|Coronavirus, COVID-19, Medicaid, Medicare|

MACPAC Meets

The Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission met for two days last week in Washington, D.C. The following is MACPAC’s own summary of the sessions. MACPAC kicked off its April meeting with a review of a draft chapter for the June 2021 report to Congress and recommendations on addressing high-cost specialty drugs. Since 2017, the Commission has been working to identify potential models that could help states address the challenges of high prices. The presentation focused on drugs that have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) under the accelerated approval pathway. Such approvals are based [...]

iqtsupport2021-04-14T06:00:46-04:00April 14, 2021|MACPAC, Medicaid, Medicaid regulations|

Medicaid Work Requirements on the Way Out?

Medicaid work requirements appear to be going away in the wake of the Supreme Court agreeing to a Biden administration request to postpone arguments in a case brought by the Trump administration seeking to reverse previous court rulings blocking implementation of such requirements. To date, 12 states have received federal approval to implement Medicaid work requirements although only one such effort, in Arkansas, ever got off the ground. All of the efforts eventually stalled in the face of legal challenges and administrative obstacles. Upon taking office, the Biden administration informed the 12 states that it was considering withdrawing their approvals [...]

iqtsupport2021-03-16T13:00:38-04:00March 16, 2021|Medicaid, Medicaid regulations|

2019 Change in Public Charge Rule to Disappear

Shortly after taking office the Biden administration stopped enforcing 2019 changes in the so-called public charge rule and now the Supreme Court has agreed to a Justice Department request to dismiss an upcoming case challenging that rule. The public charge rule, as updated in 2019, calls for all legal immigrants enrolled in Medicaid and certain other safety-net programs to be designated public charges and denied access to permanent U.S. residency and green card status. Hospitals feared that the revised rule would have a chilling effect on the willingness of some legal citizens and legal non-citizens to seek out government health [...]

iqtsupport2021-03-16T06:00:01-04:00March 16, 2021|Medicaid|

MACPAC Looks at Recipients of Provider Relief Fund Grants

What kinds of providers did and did not receive grants from the CARES Act’s Provider Relief Fund? What were the obstacles to receiving those COVID-19 relief grants and why did some providers fare better in the distribution of Provider Relief Fund resources than others? These questions and more are addressed in “COVID Relief Funding for Medicaid Providers,” a new analysis released by the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission.

iqtsupport2021-03-05T06:00:44-05:00March 5, 2021|MACPAC, Medicaid|

Medicare Pays Far More Than Medicaid for Brand-Name Drugs

Medicare pays three times as much for brand-name drugs at retail pharmacies as Medicaid and two-and-a-half times more for specialty drugs, according to a new analysis by the Congressional Budget Office. The vast difference occurs because of how drug prices are established for the two programs. Under Medicare Part D, individual payers and manufacturers negotiate prices based on commercial market conditions while for Medicaid, federal law requires manufacturers to provide rebates. Learn more about the differences between Medicare and Medicaid prescription drug prices, how and why those differences occur, and their implications in the CBO report “A Comparison of Brand-Name [...]

iqtsupport2021-02-26T06:00:54-05:00February 26, 2021|Medicaid, Medicare|

ACA Medicaid Expansion Cut Young Adult Uninsurance in Half

The number of uninsured young adults fell nearly 50 percent after the Affordable Care Act authorized states to expand their Medicaid programs, a new study has found. According to the Urban Institute, the uninsured rate among people between the ages of 19 and 25 fell from 30.2 percent to 16 percent between 2011 and 2018, with most of the decline coming between 2013 and 2016, when the first round of states expanded their Medicaid programs. The decline in the rate of uninsured young adults mirrored declines in the overall U.S. uninsured rate, which fell from 27.7 percent to 11.3 percent [...]

iqtsupport2021-02-25T13:00:37-05:00February 25, 2021|Affordable Care Act, Medicaid|

GAO Looks at “Medicaid in Times of Crisis”

The federal government often turns to Medicaid to address problems, mitigate damage, and serve vulnerable populations, especially in times of crisis. In a new issue brief, the U.S. Government Accountability Office looks at examples of how states and the federal government have turned to Medicaid in times of crisis and some of the policy considerations underlying those actions. Find these examples in the new GAO report “Medicaid in Times of Crisis.”

iqtsupport2021-02-24T13:00:53-05:00February 24, 2021|Medicaid|

Administration Continues Dismantling Medicaid Work Requirements

A week after announcing that it was withdrawing permission for states to implement approved Medicaid work requirements and would no longer entertain applications to introduce such programs, the Biden administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to cancel arguments next month on the legality of such requirements. As reported in SCOTUSblog, That argument is no longer necessary, Biden’s acting solicitor general, Elizabeth Prelogar, told the justices in a seven-page motion on Monday. The Biden administration has “preliminarily determined” that work requirements do not serve Medicaid’s goals, Prelogar wrote. Arkansas, one of the two states involved in the case, maintains that [...]

iqtsupport2021-02-24T06:00:14-05:00February 24, 2021|Medicaid|