News Release Archives

Most State Medicaid Programs Intend to Keep Pandemic-Era Expansions in Telehealth for Behavioral Health Services and Are Adopting Strategies to Address Workforce Shortages in Behavioral Health

Jan 10, 2023

News Release

Two new KFF analyses examine how state Medicaid programs have utilized telehealth to increase access to behavioral health care during the pandemic and the strategies they are employing to address workforce shortages in behavioral health. The studies come as the 2022 Bipartisan Safer Communities Act legislation requires the federal government to issue telehealth guidance by the end of 2023, and the omnibus spending bill that Congress passed last month included several provisions affecting behavioral health…

Continuous Eligibility Policies Can Reduce the Number of Children Who Lose Medicaid Despite Still Being Eligible for Coverage

Dec 21, 2022

News Release

A new KFF analysis finds disenrollment rates were lower in the 12 months leading up to annual renewals for children in states with 12-month continuous eligibility compared with states without the policy. Congress is expected to pass an omnibus spending bill by the end of the year that would require 12-month continuous eligibility for children in all states. The analysis also finds that in states with 12-month continuous eligibility, a smaller share of children disenrolled…

Large Shares of Women Report Needing Mental Health Services but Many Don’t Get Them

Dec 20, 2022

News Release

An analysis of 2022 KFF Women’s Health Survey (WHS) data finds that although large shares of women report needing mental health services over the past two years, a significant percentage did not access services they felt they needed. Fifty percent of women ages 18-64 say they needed mental health services in the past two years (including 64% of women ages 18-25), but only half of these women obtained an appointment, which may suggest unmet mental…

More Than 4 in 10 Republicans and a Third of Parents Now Oppose Schools Requiring Children to Get Vaccinated for Measles and Other Illness, Up Since the COVID-19 Pandemic Began

Dec 16, 2022

News Release

Amid controversies around the COVID-19 vaccine and growing distrust of public health authorities, more than four in ten Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, and a third of parents, now say they oppose requiring children in public schools to receive some childhood vaccines, up since 2019, a new KFF COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor survey finds. Overall, nearly three in ten adults (28%) nationally now say that parents should be able to decide not to vaccinate their children for…

PEPFAR May Improve Key Economic and Educational Outcomes, Not Just Health Outcomes

Dec 12, 2022

News Release

A new KFF analysis finds that the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the U.S. global HIV/AIDS response and the largest commitment by any nation to address a single disease in history, is associated with improvements in key economic and educational outcomes in countries that received PEPFAR support. Specifically, the program may have helped to grow per capita GDP and reduce the shares of girls and boys who are out of school. PEPFAR may…

Most Nursing Home Staff and Residents Are Not Up to Date with Their COVID-19 Vaccines

Dec 12, 2022

News Release

As winter approaches, a new KFF analysis finds that less than half (45%) of all nursing facility residents and less than a quarter of staff (22%) are up to date with their COVID-19 vaccinations. That is a sharp drop from the 87 percent of nursing facility residents and staff who completed their primary vaccination series. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) now defines being up to date as “having received a bivalent…

COVID-19 Vaccines Could Cost Billions of Dollars More Each Year If the Federal Government Ends Its Bulk Purchasing Program

Dec 7, 2022

News Release

If the federal government runs out of money to purchase COVID-19 vaccines, the per-dose price likely would skyrocket and could increase spending on vaccines by billions of dollars a year, a new KFF analysis finds. To date, the federal government has spent more than $30 billion on COVID-19 vaccines to encourage their development, guarantee a market, and ensure that the public can access them at no charge. The Biden administration has said it can no…

The Nation’s Largest For-Profit Health Systems Have Typically Had Operating Margins That Meet or Exceed Pre-Pandemic Levels

Dec 5, 2022

News Release

Despite higher inflation and dwindling COVID-19 relief funding from the federal government, the nation’s largest for-profit health systems so far this year have operating margins that meet or exceed levels in 2019 prior to the pandemic, a new KFF analysis finds. The analysis examines the financial performance of the three largest for-profit systems in the country, HCA Healthcare, Tenet Healthcare Corporation, and Community Health Systems, which collectively account for about 8 percent of all community…

The Small Share of Employers Offering Retiree Health Benefits Are Increasingly Turning to Medicare Advantage

Dec 1, 2022

News Release

Few employers offer retiree health benefits, and those that do increasingly are turning to Medicare Advantage plans to provide that coverage – a shift that has implications both for retirees and for federal spending, finds a new KFF analysis. Among the relatively small share of large firms (200 or more workers) that offer retiree health benefits to Medicare-age retirees, half (50%) provide these benefits through a Medicare Advantage plan in 2022, according to the analysis…

More Than Half a Million People in the U.S. Are On Waiting Lists for Medicaid Home- and Community-Based Services, But Waiting Lists Can Both Overstate and Understate Unmet Need

Nov 28, 2022

News Release

About 656,000 people across the country were on state waiting lists for home and community-based services financed through Medicaid waivers in 2021, finds a new KFF analysis. But such waiting lists are an incomplete and often inaccurate measure that can both overstate and understate unmet need. The data about waiting lists are among the latest findings from the 20th KFF survey of state officials administering Medicaid HCBS programs in all 50 states and Washington DC.…

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