Give vulnerable Medicaid beneficiaries a smooth landing
Awell-intentioned federal regulation is expiring, with possibly harmful effects on millions of Americans. Created in response to the COVID pandemic, it allowed Americans to remain on Medicaid without fulfilling all the eligibility requirements. The sudden loss of eligibility for so many Americans — including hundreds of thousands Pennsylvanians — is a potential social and medical crisis.
Even though stuck with the consequences of a federal regulation that the Biden administration allowed to run far too long, the Shapiro administration must soften the landing for those about to lose coverage.
In March 2020, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) required states to stop removing Medicaid recipients from the program, even if they became ineligible. The compassionate and correct idea was to ensure that no one on medical assistance lost coverage during an acute public health emergency and economic recession.
No one could have predicted then that the policy would last three years. Over those three years, millions of people were added to the rolls and almost none were taken off. The result of the Biden administration’s unwillingness to end the policy is an avoidable crisis: 15 million Americans got used to medical aid for which they were not eligible, and that aid was always going to expire.
Beginning on April 1, every Medicaid beneficiary will receive a letter from the state 90 days before their renewal date asking them to provide information to prove their eligibility. Anyone who doesn’t reply in time will be kicked off the program.
Many beneficiaries — those added to the program during the emergency — have never had to do this before. The rest have not had to do it for three years. On-the-ground healthcare advocates report that very few people understand what’s about to happen to them.
Governor Josh Shapiro’s administration announced $6 million in ad spending to bring the message to those who need it. That’s a good start. But a federal policy caused this problem and the federal government should do the same. In the coming weeks and months, we should routinely see slick PSAs from Washington on our screens, just as we did at the beginning of the Affordable Care Act.
Meanwhile, the Shapiro administration, building on Governor Tom Wolf’s work, is promising to funnel everyone who loses Medicaid benefits into the state’s health insurance exchange, called Pennie, or into the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). The administration should ensure the agencies responsible refer them smoothly and efficiently. The last thing people facing the loss of their heathcare need is to be given the runaround by the government — due to a problem created by the government.
In future health crises, this avoidable problem should be considered a lesson in the dangers of good intentions alone. Now, though, it’s time to do right by the people the policy was intended to help, and get them onto an alternative, affordable healthcare plan.