MEDICAID EXPANSION ACTUALLY HELPS PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has a blog post this week which highlights some misinformation which exists related to Medicaid expansion and Medicaid coverage for people with disabilities as some have claimed that Medicaid expansion could divert funds to care for people with disabilities. In fact, as we have reported before, Medicaid expansion has actually been a great assistance to people with disabilities by providing them with alternative ways to access Medicaid coverage. This has led to higher rates of employment for people with disabilities in expansion states vs. non-expansion states. You can read more about this in our article summarizing the research by the University of Kansas.
As we’ve stated previously, AAHD has concerns about the recent expansion of short-term, limited-duration health insurance plans which are now allowed under a recent regulation from the Trump Administration. CBPP posted another blog this week on the action attempted by Senate Democrats this week which would have rolled back these regulations. While the Senate resolution failed on Wednesday mostly along party lines, the blog also highlights litigation started by several patient groups challenging the rules. Our NDNRC partner, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) was one of the groups who filed this lawsuit. AAHD has joined a coalition of 80 organizations in a letter supporting this lawsuit.
AAHD will be presenting on CBPP’s fall “Beyond the Basics” webinar series this coming Thursday, October 18, 2018 at 2:00 PM ET. In this webinar, we will address disability etiquette and basic accessibility considerations for anyone doing enrollment work, as well as provide an overview of questions a person with a disability needs to think about when considering their health care options in the marketplace. You can register now for this webinar.
For links to register for the other CBPP webinars this month, check out our news item. The news item also includes links to archives of the previous webinars in the “Beyond the Basics” series.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a report this week which shows a decrease in premiums of approximately 1.5% for the second lowest cost silver plans in the states operating on the federally facilitated marketplace. To learn more or to view CMS’s press release or state-by-state chart showing what the premiums are in each state, check out our news item which also includes an editorial note on the effect the Trump Administration has had on premiums.
The Kaiser Family Foundation which looks at the Medicaid work requirements which were recently implemented in Arkansas. The analysis shows that many Medicaid enrollees are still not aware of the new rules of the complex implementation of Medicaid work requirements. To learn more or to download the issue brief, check out our news item.
If you want to learn more about Medicaid work requirements, we published a blog post in February which captures all the news and resources on the waivers where states are adding work requirements to their Medicaid programs.
Section 1115 of the Medicaid program gives states the ability to seek waivers from CMS for their state Medicaid program. Waivers under 1115 could be in a wide variety of areas including expanding coverage in the areas of behavioral health to restricting access to coverage through work requirements. The Kaiser Family Foundation has an online tracker which shows which states have approved or pending 1115 waivers. This tracker includes charts which shows what the various waivers accomplish in their states.
If you missed it last week, the Kaiser Family Foundation has released a series of state specific Medicaid fact sheets which includes breakdowns of several demographics related to health insurance and Medicaid coverage. To learn more or to download the fact sheet they did on Medicaid coverage throughout the United States, check out our news item. You can find each state’s fact sheet on the individual state page which can be reached from the State Resource map on our website.
If you want to learn more about our new project with the NIH’s All of Us Research Project, check out the Frequently Asked Questions document about the program.
Are you looking for local partners to help with outreach to the disability community? The NDNRC has Community Outreach Collaboratives (COCs) which work to increase collaborations in the community, dissemination and outreach efforts and enrollment of people with disabilities in the ACA marketplace. You can find a COC, on the COC page of our website.
Archives of our weekly updates are available on the NDNRC website.