This has been a very busy week for Medicaid news. Let’s start with the big news. Work requirements for Medicaid have been struck down in Arkansas and Kentucky.
The judge who had both cases in his court room hammered home a simple point: The core purpose of Medicaid is the provision and payment of medical services for qualified individuals. Everything else is not core.
These rulings are limited to only these two states. The impact of these rulings are not limited to these states.
Within an hour of work requirements being legally struck in Kentucky and Arkansas, Idaho puts a hold on adding work requirements to their expansion. https://t.co/99g3O3wSLi
— Emma Sandoe (@emma_sandoe) March 27, 2019
Iowa has also canned their work requirement legislation. The district court judge has set a very high standard for a work requirement waiver to clear and new work requirement legislation merely guarantees work for a lot of lawyers.
Harold Pollack raises a good point about these rulings as potentially not good news for future expansions:
I do worry that striking down work requirements may hurt many people. Although these are bad policies, they provide a politically dignified path for red state Republicans to expand coverage.
— Harold Pollack (@haroldpollack) March 28, 2019
I think that there is another pathway forward and that is partial Medicaid expansions to only 100% Federal Poverty Level instead of 138%. Georgia is joining Utah on this waiver request:
Georgia Becomes Latest State To Push For Partial Medicaid Expansion https://t.co/9IE8DnmIch
— InsideHealthPolicy (@InHealthPolicy) March 27, 2019
Finally there are strong rumors that something interesting could be happening in North Carolina for Medicaid Expansion:
All signs indicate North Carolina is on its way to some type of Medicaid expansion. Expect significant compromises to bring along majority conservative legislature. https://t.co/ejka4LzB53
— Alex Gertner (@setmoreoff) March 26, 2019
So there is a lot of Medicaid action this week and the next few months promise an avalanche.