Filling the need for trusted information on national health issues
This issue brief highlights key differences between Medicare and Medicaid and raises questions about how a policy to lower the age of Medicare eligibility could affect individuals who are currently enrolled in Medicaid.
This brief examines the cost and use of health care among low-income nonelderly adults who are covered by Medicaid relative to their expected service use and costs if they instead had employer-sponsored insurance (ESI) coverage or were uninsured. The analysis controls for a wide array of factors that also influence utilization and spending in an effort to isolate the specific effects of Medicaid coverage. Consistent with previous research, the analysis underscores how Medicaid facilitates access to care for program beneficiaries.
Recognizing that ongoing vaccination efforts are crucial to ending the pandemic, CMS issued an Interim Final Rule with Comment Period (IFC) that establishes new vaccine reporting and/or education requirements for nursing homes and ICF/IDDs as of May 21st, 2021. Public comments are due July 12, 2021, after which CMS may revise the rule.
Although attention in current federal actions is largely focused on Medicare and private insurance drug prices, federal legislation also has been recently introduced or enacted that would affect Medicaid prescription drug policy.
This issue brief examines some of the other options policymakers may consider to extend coverage to people in the gap, including increased fiscal incentives for states, a narrower public option, and making people with incomes below the poverty level eligible for enhanced ACA premium subsidies.
This fact sheet describes the characteristics of the uninsured and explains the recent increase in this population. It also examines the difference that health insurance can make and how health reform is expected to cover millions more people.
Medicaid, the provider of health insurance coverage for about one in five Americans and the largest payer for long-term care services in the community and nursing homes, continues to be a key part of health policy debates at the federal and state level. Key Medicaid issues to watch in 2020 include: Medicaid expansion developments; Section 1115 waiver activity; enrollment and spending trends; benefits, payment and delivery system reforms, and the implications of the 2020 elections.
This issue brief takes a close look at Section 1115 waiver activity in the final days of the Trump Administration, including approval of Tennessee’s TennCare III program, to understand implications for the Biden Administration.
This explainer provides an overview of the federal “Ending the HIV Epidemic” initiative and explores issues that might mitigate or facilitate its success.
The inclusion of major Medicaid changes in both the American Health Care Act (AHCA) that passed in the House and the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA) considered in the Senate revealed that is hard to gain consensus on significant cuts and reforms to Medicaid. Medicaid has broad general support and intense support from special populations served by the program. In addition, proposed changes would have different implications across states due to significant program variation across states, including implementation of the ACA Medicaid expansion as well as other health status, demographic and state fiscal circumstances.
