Post by Logan on Mar 31, 2016 0:03:31 GMT -6
Calls for Medicaid expansion, limits on paperwork, in health insurance overhaul
Speakers at the first formal public hearing on the state’s planned Medicaid overhaul said they wanted the government insurance expanded to cover more people, worried that increased paperwork would drive away doctors, and asked why the state was changing a system at all.
The state Department of Health and Human Services is preparing to ask the federal government to approve major changes in Medicaid that will have most of its beneficiaries sign up for health plans run by insurance companies, hospitals or other providers. Medicaid privatization was a priority for legislators last year.
State health officials said the changes will give beneficiaries more options, improve health, and contain costs. The state would no longer pay for each doctor’s visit or procedure, but would pay the health plans a set sum for each patient enrolled.
Medicaid covers 1.9 million people, mostly low-income children and their parents, the elderly and the disabled. It costs the state about $14 billion, with the federal government paying about two-thirds.
Read more here: www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/under-the-dome/article69140682.html
Speakers at the first formal public hearing on the state’s planned Medicaid overhaul said they wanted the government insurance expanded to cover more people, worried that increased paperwork would drive away doctors, and asked why the state was changing a system at all.
The state Department of Health and Human Services is preparing to ask the federal government to approve major changes in Medicaid that will have most of its beneficiaries sign up for health plans run by insurance companies, hospitals or other providers. Medicaid privatization was a priority for legislators last year.
State health officials said the changes will give beneficiaries more options, improve health, and contain costs. The state would no longer pay for each doctor’s visit or procedure, but would pay the health plans a set sum for each patient enrolled.
Medicaid covers 1.9 million people, mostly low-income children and their parents, the elderly and the disabled. It costs the state about $14 billion, with the federal government paying about two-thirds.
Read more here: www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/under-the-dome/article69140682.html