The Trump Administration Is Coming For Medicaid Again

[riversedge]

Source: huff post




01/30/2020 04:43 pm ET Updated 4 hours ago

It just proposed a radical change in the program that could cut benefits for “healthy adults.”


The Trump administration is back with a new initiative that could make it harder for some low-income Americans to get health care.

Officials on Thursday told states that they can request major changes in the operation and funding of their Medicaid programs. Under the new arrangement, the outlines of which were first reported by Politico over the weekend, states would have more leeway to modify benefits and eligibility standards for some parts of the population.


In return, states would have to accept a more limited commitment of funds from the federal government.

The initiative is by all accounts the brainchild of Seema Verma, chief administrator for Medicare and Medicaid. In a press call Thursday morning, she said the new flexibility will allow states to experiment with ways of providing better care at a lower cost, while freeing up more resources to provide care for the people who need it most.

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This new financing option is a variation on what’s known as a “block grant,” which would end the federal government’s open-ended promise to finance Medicaid coverage for whoever needs it, however much it costs. Republicans have historically promoted block grants as a way to limit or reduce Medicaid spending, and many experts believe such proposals would lead to cuts in enrollment or benefits that would harm beneficiaries.

That potential has stirred up opposition and helps explain why Medicaid block grants have never gotten the support they needed to get through Congress...........................................

Read more: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-verma-medicaid-block-grant_n_5e326e50c5b6f26233240fb6

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Trumps mob is doing lots of harm--quietly while the trial goes on.



@morethanmySLE 33m
🚨
TONIGHT from DES MOINES: Emergency Room Doctor @DrRobDavidson
CONFRONTS Mike Pence on #MedicaidBlockGrants

Pence's Response: We did?

He KNOWS what he's doing.

Block grants will HARM MILLIONS! And the VP doesn't care.
😡
💔


We *must* #ProtectOurCare

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Rollout event for #Medicaid block grant/cap guidance repeated so many long debunked attacks on Medicaid. One of worst was falsely blaming expansion for waiting lists for home & community based services. My former colleague @JudyCBPP
refuted back in 2017:

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[yaesu]

1. They already did this in MI this month, kicking over 50k off due to work requirements. nt

[progree]

2. The "How The Proposal Would Affect Beneficiaries" section explains how this is

so much more than just work requirements.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-verma-medicaid-block-grant_n_5e326e50c5b6f26233240fb6

And this on the block grant aspect:

As far back as the 1980s, GOP leaders have been trying to shift Medicaid over to a system in which states could alter their programs in ways that would limit or reduce its reach ― by, for example, paying for fewer services than current Medicaid guidelines would permit.

In return, states would get a fixed sum (aka, a block grant) from the federal government, with the understanding that they could keep some of the savings if the program costs less than expected but would face shortfalls if it cost more.

... In practice, past proposals to introduce Medicaid block grants have always threatened to reduce coverage and, in the process, access to health care. A version of these reforms were in some of the 2017 bills to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and the potential impact on beneficiaries was one reason that effort proved so unpopular.

Now the Trump administration says states can change their financing in more or less the same fashion even without new legislation, because Medicaid allows states to get waivers if they want to experiment with new coverage models.

[cstanleytech]

3. Hey if the House and Senate Republicans want to commit political suicide by not stopping this

which they can easily do by enough Republicans supporting a veto proof bill that blocks it then have at it.

[SKKY]

4. This sucks, big time, for many people...

...but I can see this being a huge negative for Mr. Trump in November. I look at it as a “If your adversary is making a mistake, don’t interrupt him,” sort of thing.

[gab13by13]

5. Correct me if I'm wrong

but this seems to me to be an attack on states that accepted Medicaid expansion, which would be mostly blue states.
States that did not take Medicaid expansion are exempt.

Republicans are making a wrong assumption, however, if they believe the lie that mostly Democrats are on Medicaid, that's what the Trumpers that live around me believe.

[riversedge]

6. This is more #TRUMP chipping away with our Health care-just like they have done with women's health

are rights -and are doing it with #transgender rights and #asylumseekers rights. The list goes on and on.

[Grasswire2]

7. when Granpa get kicked out of his nursing home bed, kids...

....he's coming to live with you. All those chores done by health care workers will be yours.

My 96 year old great aunt, whose estate has run out of money and is now on medicaid for nursing home care, bit a caregiver the other day. She doesn't require hand feeding yet. But she will.

Coming soon, children. Coming soon.

[Maxheader]

8. STumpys feeling like..

hot shit right now...Beat the libs in two cases...
Lets hope the hand-job over reaches on his entitlements changes that the 30%ers
go for a democrat in november..