Thursday, April 10, 2014

New Hampshire joins the Medicaid Party

It's been lost over the general noise of the debate surrounding the recent close of the enrollment period for the health exchanges, but on March 27, New Hampshire became the 26th state to accept the Medicaid expansion.

New Hampshire --split between a Democratic governor and lower house on one hand, and a GOP-controlled upper house on the other -- negotiated an interesting path to expansion, as
Most importantly over the short term, 50,000 people are going to get access to health insurance -- and by extension, health care -- that they didn't have before.  After all, that's the point of the Affordable Care Act, right?

It's also a milestone of sorts now that more that half of the states are in the expanded Medicaid program. Of the 26, five are under split control (New York, Nevada, New Hampshire, Arkansas and Iowa) and four are under complete GOP control (Michigan, Ohio, North Dakota and Arizona). The Medicaid expansion isn't just a program for dirty hippies and effete coastal elites any more.

The current state of play in the states regarding Medicaid expansion can be found at the ever-useful Kaiser Foundation.

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