MEDICAID
The following podcast was recorded May 5, 2008.
Hello, this is Congressman John D. Dingell. Welcome to my podcast.
I want to commend my House colleagues on passing H.R. 5613, the “Protecting the Medicaid Safety Net Act,” which I authored with Representative Tim Murphy. This bill will place a temporary, one-year moratorium on seven Bush Administration-imposed Medicaid regulations would make significant cuts to the Medicaid program. The bill passed the House on April 23 rd, with strong bipartisan support by a vote of 349-62.
You might ask, “how damaging would these regulations be if they were enacted?” The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform found that states stand to lose $50 billion in federal matching funds over the next five years. The respected health care advocacy organization, Families USA, took a look at how the regulations could affect my own state of Michigan:
- We stand to lose an estimated $732.2 million in Medicaid funds the first year and $3.9 billion over 5 years.
- With fewer dollars circulating through Michigan’s economy, it is expected that the State will lose:
- $1.5 billion in business activity
- 15,300 jobs
- $572.4 million in lost wages
- 15,000 special needs children would lose rehabilitation services;
- Another 29,000 developmentally disabled adults and children would lose rehabilitation services;
- 23,000 adults and 5,100 children who participate in supported independent living arrangements or group homes would lose access to critical community services and resources.
Despite the bipartisan effort to stop these regulations, the White House continues to try and push the regulations forward without a thorough and proper examination of the issues and the effect they will have on the States and the people served by this program. The Administration has ignored public comments submitted on the regulations, and even threatened to veto this bill which has such broad support.
There is little support outside of HHS for these actions. In fact, all 50 Governors oppose these rules, as does the National Association of State Medicaid directors, National Conference of State Legislators, and the National Association of Counties. More than 2,000 national and local groups – such as the American Hospital Association, the American Federation of Teachers, and the March of Dimes – support our bill. They know the devastating effect these rules would have on local communities, their hospitals, and vulnerable beneficiaries.
While I want to commend my Republican colleagues for their support on this bill, we know that more needs to be done to fix our broken health care system. Democrats have tried to make health insurance more available to children, only to be turned away by this administration. This can’t go on and we hope we can at least put the brakes on this for one more year.
After that – well, that’s up to you the voters. We have a chance to get a person with different ideas in the White House next year. Please consider your choices carefully.
This is John Dingell. Thank you for listening.
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