The domestic policy legislation the House advanced in May includes the most substantial rollback of the Affordable Care Act since President Donald Trump and his Republican allies tried to pass legislation in 2017 that would have largely repealed President Barack Obama’s signature domestic accomplishment.
The Indian Health Service was mostly spared in the federal government’s widespread staffing cuts, but tribal governments and organizations have lost funding elsewhere in the melee of federal health agency cuts.
As state officials anticipate Medicaid funding cuts that could strip resources for those with disabilities and chronic health conditions, an army of unpaid caregivers waits in the wings: children. At least 5.4 million kids are estimated to be caring for family members at home, a number likely to rise if Medicaid cuts hit professional home-based services.
Federal law says Medicaid must cover out-of-state emergency care. But a Florida man got a five-figure bill after a South Dakota hospital declined to charge his state’s Medicaid program.
Medicaid plays a vital role in many rural communities that favored President Donald Trump in the 2024 election. But residents still seem open to Republican proposals to cut perceived waste in the program.
The House narrowly passed a budget reconciliation bill, including billions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy along with billions of dollars in cuts to health program spending. But the Senate is expected to make major changes to the measure before it can go to President Donald Trump for his signature. This week’s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Health News, Anna Edney of Bloomberg News, Sarah Karlin-Smith of the Pink Sheet, and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico.
A GOP tax-and-spending bill the House approved Thursday would slash federal Medicaid reimbursement for states that offer health coverage to immigrants without legal status.
Late last year, South Carolina Medicaid approved a class of medications known as GLP-1s to treat obesity, placing it among the few state programs covering these effective but expensive drugs. But access remains limited, even for patients covered by Medicaid, because of stringent prerequisites that must be satisfied before starting the drug.
One thing experts agree on: The damage from the funding cuts will be varied and immense.
About half of states have broadened Medicaid, the state-federal low-income health care program, to pay for social services such as housing and nutritional support. The Trump administration, however, views these experiments as distractions from the core mission to provide health care.
