Search results for: “expanding coverage”
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Making Sense of Public Statements: Universal Access to Coverage
As news reports attempt to keep up with the fast-paced developments in ideas for fundamentally changing the nation’s health insurance infrastructure for low-and moderate-income Americans, we should focus on the underlying ideas driving the debates. Paying careful attention to the language used to talk about the features of various proposals to modify the 2010 Patient…
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Ensuring Healthy Moms: The Case for Extending Medicaid Postpartum Coverage
Missouri is experiencing a maternal mortality crisis, with mortality rates double the national average. The situation is even more dire for Black parents, who die from pregnancy-related complications four times more often than white parents. Researchers have found that many of these deaths stem from preventable causes and occur later in the postpartum period. Although…
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A Constitutional Right to Medicaid Coverage
There is no single issue more important to the Foundation’s work and mission than Medicaid expansion and achieving health equity in Missouri. In August of 2020, a substantial majority of Missouri voters approved an amendment to ingrain Medicaid expansion into Missouri’s constitution. Thanks to the will of the people, expanded Medicaid enrollment was set to…
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The Right Medicine for American Health Care
In a previous post, a diagnosis of American health care ills revealed that – for various reasons – the American Health Care Act is the wrong medicine. In this post we build on that diagnosis to explore prescriptions for giving the country the right medicine, suggesting a pathway to healing the system and improving the…
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Medicaid Expansion: Seven things the public should know about the evidence
In 2012, the Supreme Court affirmed the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act but made Medicaid expansion optional for states. This resulted in a natural experiment in which 37 states (including the District of Columbia) expanded Medicaid and 14 have not, including Missouri. As Missouri considers Medicaid expansion, we have the unusual opportunity to learn…
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The Deep Divide: State Borders Create Medicaid Haves And Have-Nots
By: Laura Ungar ST. LOUIS — Patricia Powers went a few years without health insurance and couldn’t afford regular doctor visits. So she had no idea cancerous tumors were silently growing in both of her breasts. If Powers lived just across the Mississippi River in Illinois, she would have qualified for Medicaid, the federal-state health…
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The Future of Universal Health Insurance (Deja Vu)
When I was working at Bellevue Hospital in New York City after college, it felt like national health insurance was “just around the corner.” Multiple plans were introduced in Congress and President Nixon offered his own proposal. Most knowledgeable observers assumed the country would have health insurance for everyone, the only question was which plan…
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For the Sake of Racial Equity, It’s Time for Nationwide Medicaid Expansion
It took more than a decade of work from countless organizations and dedicated individuals to make it a reality, but on July 22, the Missouri Supreme Court reaffirmed the will of the state’s voters by unanimously declaring that Medicaid expansion is the law of the land. Having only moved to Missouri and joined the Foundation…
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COVID-19 Shines a Spotlight on the Need for Medicaid Expansion in Missouri
COVID-19 presents two massive challenges for our society. The first is the direct challenge to our health. The second is the challenge to our economy from the collective measures undertaken to prevent or slow the spread of the disease. Both challenges highlight the extensive inequities in our population’s health, health insurance, and health care systems.…
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Systems Change is the Change We Need
Conversation starter: Ask your friends if they feel optimistic about the times that we’re living in and the progress being made. Depending on who you call friends, I think you’ll get a mix of responses. Those not on the receiving end of society’s marginalizations would probably say yes. Those on the other side of the…