Name: Medicaid expansion could bring Texas $5.4 billion in federal dollars, study says
Brand: houstonchronicle.com
SKU: houstonchronicle-com-326
Availability: OnlineOnly

critic

Medicaid expansion could bring Texas $5.4 billion in federal dollars, study says

preview

Expanding Medicaid in Texas could bring as much as $5.4 billion federal dollars into the state and enroll nearly 1 million more people in the federal safety-net insurance program, according to a new study by Texas A&amp;M researchers.Health policy experts said Medicaid expansion would help drive down the state’s , which was the highest nationwide at 18.4 percent in 2019, according to U.S. Census Bureau.The study estimates that roughly 1.2 million Texans would qualify if the state Legislature to include low-income individuals who make 138 percent or less of the federal poverty line. To qualify for Medicaid in Texas currently, an individual must be 18 or younger, over 65, pregnant or disabled. Their income must not exceed the federal poverty line.The researchers estimate that 223,700 Harris County residents would be eligible for Medicaid if it were expanded.About 954,000 state residents would enroll if they qualified under the expansion, according to the study, which was conducted by Texas A&amp;M's Bush School of Government and Public Service and funded by the Episcopal Health Foundation, a Houston-based community health advocacy nonprofit.More Gwendolyn WuAbout 954,000 state residents would enroll if they qualified under the expansion, according to the study, which was conducted by Texas A&amp;M's Bush School of Government and Public Service and funded by the Episcopal Health Foundation, a Houston-based community health advocacy nonprofit.Texas is one of 12 states that have not adopted the expansion. If the state expanded Medicaid, the federal government would pay 90 percent of the cost and the state would pay 10 percent.“We see no significant changes in spending from other state revenues, and no evidence that states cut back on other priority areas like transportation or education” to pay for Medicaid expansion, said Laura Dague, one of the study’s authors.Gov. Greg Abbott has long , previously calling the insurance program “broken and bloated.” The governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment.The state’s approach to Medicaid is a factor in the high rate of uninsured residents, experts said.“There are all sorts of studies, including some of the public opinion polling we have done, that show that people who have insurance are more likely to access health care than people who don’t have insurance,” said Elena Marks, president of the Episcopal Health Foundation.Marks said despite criticism that Medicaid expansion would add more patients to a system that does not have enough physicians who accept the insurance, it’s more important to ensure that low-income communities have some sort of access to doctors.During the pandemic, medical leaders and health policy experts have renewed calls to expand Medicaid in Texas to help cover low-wage workers at high risk of COVID-19 exposure. Helping people get coverage could also lead to higher revenues for health care providers, Dague said.gwendolyn.wu@chron.comtwitter.com/gwendolynawu

Expanding Medicaid in Texas could bring as much as $5.4 billion federal dollars into the state and enroll nearly 1 million more people in the federal safety-net insurance program, according to a new study by Texas A&amp;M researchers.Health policy experts said Medicaid expansion would help drive down the state’s , which was the highest nationwide at 18.4 percent in 2019, according to U.S. Census Bureau.The study estimates that roughly 1.2 million Texans would qualify if the state Legislature to include low-income individuals who make 138 percent or less of the federal poverty line. To...

public

Gwendolyn Wu

houstonchronicle.com

Credible

Speculation

Anecdotal Evidence

Generalization

Stacking the Deck

Appeal to Authority

Straw Man

Slippery Slope

Emotional Appeal

Red Herring

False Dilemma

Illogical

Moral Equivalency

Ad Hominem

Correlation w/o Causation

Semantics

Begging the Question

Faulty Analogy

Non Sequitur

Bandwagon

Dogmatism

Failing Occam's Razor

Biased

Pure Opinion

Hit Piece

Racial Bias

National Bias

Religious Bias

Financial Incentive

Political Agenda

Gender Bias

Misused Image/Video

Study Misinterpreted

Mistake

Misused Term

Science Misrepresented

Factual Error

Satire

Surface Level

Lack of Reliable Sources

Sensational

Not Credible

Investigative

Balanced

Well Sourced

Great Context

sports

entertainment

U.S.

international

business

technology

science

culture

politics

media

health

Medicaid expansion could bring Texas $5.4 billion in federal dollars, study says

No article scores yet.

CRITIC REVIEWS

PUBLIC REVIEWS