The Host
Several states have begun the herculean task of redetermining how many of an estimated 85 million Americans currently receiving health coverage through the Medicaid program are still eligible. To receive federal covid-19 relief funds, states were required to keep enrollees covered during the pandemic. As many as 15 million people could be struck from the program’s rolls — many of whom are still eligible, or are eligible for other programs and need to be steered to them.
Meanwhile, the trustees of the Medicare program report that its Hospital Insurance Trust Fund should remain solvent until 2031, three years longer than it projected last year. That allows lawmakers to continue to put off what are likely to be politically unpleasant decisions, although they will eventually have to deal with Medicare’s underlying financial woes (and those of Social Security).
This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KHN, Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico, Amy Goldstein of The Washington Post, and Rachel Roubein of The Washington Post.
Among the takeaways from this week’s episode:
The Medicaid “unwinding” is likely to strip health coverage not just from millions of people who are no longer eligible for the program, but also from millions of people who still are. States are supposed to take their time reevaluating eligibility, but some are rushing to disenroll people.
Another complication in an already complicated task is that many Medicaid workers hired during the pandemic have never actually redetermined Medicaid eligibility for anyone, because states had been required to keep people who qualified on the program.
Grimly, some of the extra years of solvency gained in the Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund are a result of pandemic deaths in the 65-and-older population.
The Department of Health and Human Services has issued payment rules for Medicare Advantage Plans for 2024. The agency ended up conceding at least somewhat to private plans that for years have been receiving more than they should have from the U.S. Treasury. The new rules will work to shrink those overpayments going forward, but not try to recoup those from years past.
The situation with “first-dollar coverage” of preventive services by commercial health plans is becoming a bit clearer following last week’s decision in Texas that part of the Affordable Care Act’s preventive services mandate is unconstitutional …