Were you at the Capitol last week for the our Texas Well & Healthy Medicaid and ACA Boot Camps? The turnout was phenomenal, and we were so pleased to see so many legislative staffers and advocacy groups in the room. If you couldn’t make it, however, never fear. Now’s your chance to catch this information through our downloadable slide shows!
Last Tuesday and Wednesday, I helped legislators, staffers, and advocates get up to speed on what the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the proposed Medicaid Expansion have to offer Texans.
Now that the Supreme Court and the presidential elections are over, the ACA is going forward as planned. Texans need to know what to expect as provisions in the law come online in the next 11 months. The presentation (click here to download) covers the law in a “greatest hits” format. Topics include the essential health benefits (EHBs), the health insurance marketplace (also known as the Exchange), new industry regulations, consumer protections, and more.
While most of the ACA is definitely moving forward nation-wide, one part of the law, the proposed Medicaid Expansion, is dependent upon state enrollment. Texas has the opportunity now to opt into the expanded Medicaid program, which would bring an additional 1.5 to 2 million uninsured Texans under health insurance coverage at almost no cost to the state of Texas. Our Medicaid Boot Camp PowerPoint presentation (click here to download) explains how the program works, how Texans stands to benefit both from a fiscal and a public health perspective. While my presentation does a good job of outlining the common sense nature of opting in to the Medicaid Expansion, perhaps nobody has presented the logic in such a compelling manner as Governor Jan Brewer (R-Arizona), in the following quote from her recent State of the State address. Though Governor Brewer initially resisted the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, and in fact was one of the architects of the Supreme Court case, she has since come full circle, and explained her decision in the following way:
