Earlier this week, the Chamber approved the Republican Budget Resolution. An objective is to reduce $ 2 billion during a decade of the federal budget, which could bring significant cuts to Medicaid.
Medicaid is a joint program of federal and state health insurance for disabled and low -income Americans. Medicare centers & Medicaid Services works with state programs to administer Medicaid, who registered More than 72.1 million people.
Medicaid offers benefits that include care for nursing homes, personal care services and assistance to pay premiums and other costs, according to CMS.
Health policy experts say that Medicaid provides vital services to many vulnerable Americans and the cuts to the program could put them at risk of losing medical care, either eliminating their coverage or closing the centers that provide such attention.
“The Medicaid program provides this coverage to save lives for the most vulnerable people in our country,” Mariana Socal, associate professor of Policy and Health Management of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Bloomberg Public Health School, told ABC News. “The uncertainty surrounding coverage in the Medicaid program in the future … is a great stressful factor in the life of these people who depend on the program.”
“I think we should all agree that protecting the health of vulnerable people should be a priority in this country, not considered an opportunity for savings,” he continued. “You can save dollars, but then we are not saving lives.”
The Medicare and Medicaid Services Office, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, is located in Woodlawn, Maryland, December 28, 2010.
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Less people in medicaid or less services
One of the proposals that the Republican Party is considered to reduce Medicaid costs includes getting rid of Medicaid coincidence rates. Under him Expansion of the Health Care Law at a low price of MedicaidThe government finances 90% of the costs of those who became recently eligible under the program.
This could change to the states that the Government pays the same as it does for everyone else in the program, which is Around two thirds of total costs.
In addition, the federal government could implement per capita subsidies. Currently, the Federal Government coincides with what states spend on payment, at different levels for different states, without a budget limit.
The per capita limit would see that the federal government establishes a limit on the number of states that can be reimbursed by affiliate.
“What that means then is that, to live within that fixed budget, you would have to find individuals to cut the program or services that would not provide people in the program,” Dennis Shea, professor of health policy and administration at Penn State College of Health. And human development, he told ABC News.
Impacts on the medical care system
Mark Peterson, professor of public policy at the School of Public Affairs of UCLA Meyer and Renee Luskin, said that the problem is not only cuts in federal expense, but also how states would respond if there were a deficit in funds.
He said that Medicaid is currently the highest expense of the states, on average, and dramatic cuts in federal government financing would be a huge hole for states to fill.
“If they try to complete, they have to significantly increase taxes, which is likely not to happen, or they would have to reduce, for example, their next category of important expenses, which is not likely,” Peterson told ABC News. “And even very rich states, such as California, for example, have been going through their own budgetary struggles. Therefore, it is not as if they were sitting in a lot of money ready to reallocate. There would be extremely serious budgetary consequences.”
Mary Beth Cochran de Clyde, North Carolina, goes to a demonstration with the Democrats of the House of Representatives to speak against the Republican Budget Law proposed outside the Capitol of the United States, on February 25, 2025, in Washington.
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Experts say that Medicaid cuts would also affect the medical care system. Medicaid provides A lot of funds For hospitals, long -term care centers, nursing homes and services for children with special needs.
Shea said an example is that Medicaid pays More than 60% of elderly household residents. If the funds are cut, then residents will not have money to pay attention to the elderly and nursing homes will not receive that income, which could lead to the closure of nursing homes.
Rural residents could receive less attention
Rural Americans would also be at risk of losing services. Shea said that many rural hospitals and community health centers have already closed and those who remain open already face financing challenges.
If they had Medicaid funds, they could face closures, which could deprive rural Americans of vital health services, he explained.
“In rural areas, Medicaid coverage tends to be a greater proportion of coverage, so it is not unusual for 30, 40, 50% of people in a rural area that are covered by Medicaid,” he said. “And if that source of income does not enter hospitals or nursing homes or medical practices in those areas, it makes it much more difficult for those companies to survive.”
“And so, we would probably see thousands of nursing homes near rural areas … and I would also see hundreds of hospitals closing,” he added.
