Analysis: 380,000 Arizonans may lose Medicaid
PHOENIX — Arizona is likely to see more than 380,000 people lose their Medicaid insurance coverage and $2.5 billion in lower health care spending under the plan currently being pushed through Congress to replace former President Barack Obama’s health care law, according to a new state report.
The analysis by the state’s Medicaid plan obtained by The Associated Press Friday shows keeping most of those people insured would cost the state nearly $500 million a year by 2023. In a Republican-led state where tax increases are nearly impossible to enact, that’s extremely unlikely.
The report looks at the patients who gained coverage under a Medicaid expansion pushed through in 2013 by former Gov. Jan Brewer over opposition from many in her own party. It now covers about 400,000 Arizonans out of the 1.9 million covered by Medicaid in the state.
Of those 400,000, about 316,000 are childless adults who earn less than the federal poverty limit, and 81,000 earn between 100 percent and 138 percent of the limit.
Brewer said in an interview earlier this week that “it weighs heavy on my heart” when she thinks of the current Republican plan to repeal and replace Obama’s law.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that 14 million fewer Americans would have Medicaid insurance by 2026 under the plan, while the cuts would save the federal government $880 billion between 2017-2026.
Gov. Doug Ducey said earlier this week that he isn’t pleased with the current proposal.
“I’ve said that I don’t want to see anybody have the rug pulled out from underneath them, and that’s what I’m going to be advocating,” he told reporters Tuesday. “I have concerns with the bill as its written.”
Ducey said he has the ear of the state’s congressional delegation and the new Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tom Price, and expects to see changes.
“I think you’re going to see a different bill if it does get out of the House, if it does get out of the Senate, than the bill you see today,” he said.