There is an attempt to make poor SCHIP families transfer to private insurance

[mcablue]

Appearing on the television earlier this week, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) boasted of the Senate’s efforts to keep alive the popular Children’s Health Insurance Program.

“That’s 14.1 million children who will continue to get health insurance which otherwise would be stopped,” Rockefeller told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell on Wednesday.

Well, not quite.

Although the Senate’s health-reform bill does indeed reauthorize the CHIP program through 2019 — a provision that Rockefeller himself managed to pass during the Finance Committee deliberations — the proposal provides no money to fund that extension. Without the funding, kids enrolled in CHIP would be forced into private plans on the exchange — the same scenario proposed by the House health-reform bill, which repeals CHIP altogether in 2014. Behind Rockefeller, a number of lawmakers, advocates and health policy experts have warned that such a shift would threaten to reduce coverage for kids in the name of expanding it. And independent analysts have backed that claim, finding that the out-of-pocket costs would be much higher for exchange plans, thereby discouraging those low-income families from buying their kids any health insurance at all.

http://washingtonindependent.com/71544/chip-remains-in-jeopardy-despite-rockefeller-plan


After the death of the public option, drug reimportation, Medicare buy-in, etc., it wouldn't surprise me if health insurance congressmen went after the kids.

[IndianaGreen]

1. Screw the kids! All we care about is our health and Big Pharma stocks

saith the corporate controlled Senate!

[Joe Bacon]

2. Stockholders are much more important than sick children!

And what would bring more joy to a stockholder's heart than to see sick people nailed to Blue Crosses? :sarcasm:

[asjr]

3. The more I read about this the more I believe

it is written in code especially so we can't understand it.I thought Chip was legislation all by itself and wasn't included in what is going on now.

[Laelth]

4. Yikes! How much worse can this thing get?

It's already worse than doing nothing.

:shrug:

Kill the bill.

Forcing people to buy insurance is no more the answer to a failed health care

system than forcing people to buy houses is the solution to homelessness.

:dem:

-Laelth

[pinto]

5. More Funding for CHIP, Different Rules: How Does CHIPRA (2009) Change CHIP Funding?

More Funding for CHIP, Different Rules:
How Does CHIPRA Change CHIP Funding?

The Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) was created in 1997 to provide affordable health coverage to low-income children in working families who make too much money to be eligible for Medicaid but not enough to afford private coverage. The program currently covers more than 7 million children. In February 2009, after a protracted political fi ght, Congress enacted, and President Obama signed, legislation that renewed CHIP through the end of 2013 and expanded its scope. This series of issue briefs examines the new provisions that were included in the reauthorization and how they will affect implementation in the coming months.


The CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2009 (CHIPRA) provides significantly more federal funding for children’s health coverage and new rules for distributing these funds among the states. These provisions were developed with the wisdom gained over more than a decade of experience with CHIP, during which time two issues became clear: First, states needed significantly more funding than they were receiving to maintain and expand their CHIP programs. Second, in order to enable states to cover as many eligible children as possible, the formula that determined how funds were distributed to states needed to be changed. CHIPRA addresses both these issues.

Over the next four and a half years (from mid-fiscal year 2009 through FY 2013), the federal government will have a total of $69 billion in CHIP funds to distribute among states—$25 billion in existing “baseline” funding and $44 billion in new funding (see Figure 1). The Congressional Budget Office estimates that, over the next four and a half years, the additional funding and the new outreach and enrollment tools that were included in CHIPRA will enable states to maintain coverage for the 7 million currently enrolled children and cover an additional 4.1 million uninsured children.1

This brief summarizes the new federal financing rules for CHIP, including how funding will be distributed among the states, as well as improvements to the financing system that will help ensure that states have the funding they need—when they need it—to get more children covered. These are signifi cant changes, and it is important that those who are working on children’s coverage understand them so that they can urge states to make the best possible use of the new funding that is available to cover more children in Medicaid and CHIP.

State, Original CHIP Law, New Law (CHIPRA), Increase

Alabama - $71.1, $139.5, 96%
Alaska - $10.4, $22.3, 114%
Arizona - $149.1, $171.2, 15%
Arkansas - $50.4, $133.5, 165%
California - $799.2, $1,481.2, 85%
Colorado - $71.5, $97.5, 36%
Connecticut - $37.7, $45.6, 21%
Delaware - $13.1, $15.0, 14%
District of Columbia - $12.3, $14.2, 16%
Florida - $303.0, $358.4, 18%
Georgia - $175.6, $294.2, 68%
Hawaii - $14.6, $20.8, 42%
Idaho - $23.9, $45.3, 90%
Illinois - $198.7, $344.4, 73%
Indiana - $94.5, $120.4, 27%
Iowa - $34.1, $68.4, 101%
Kansas - $37.9, $58.5, 54%
Kentucky - $67.4, $119.6, 77%
Louisiana - $84.1, $207.7, 147%
Maine - $14.7, $39.3, 166%
Maryland - $70.2, $184.2, 162%
Massachusetts - $72.4, $332.6, 359%
Michigan - $146.2, $203.4, 39%
Minnesota - $48.6, $84.1, 73%
Mississippi - $64.1, $183.7, 187%
Missouri - $81.9, $129.3, 58%
Montana - $14.5, $32.4, 124%
Nebraska - $22.5, $41.8, 86%
Nevada - $52.1, $61.4, 18%
New Hampshire - $10.6, $15.9, 50%
New Jersey - $102.2, $497.8, 387%
New Mexico - $52.0, $196.2, 277%
New York - $318.0, $391.2, 23%
North Carolina - $136.1, $245.7, 81%
North Dakota - $7.9, $17.1, 117%
Ohio - $157.3, $293.7, 87%
Oklahoma - $70.8, $144.2, 104%
Oregon - $61.3, $83.4, 36%
Pennsylvania - $167.0, $312.5, 87%
Rhode Island - $13.2, $69.5, 426%
South Carolina - $70.8, $156.0, 120%
South Dakota - $10.9, $18.4, 69%
Tennessee - $99.7, $138.4, 39%
Texas - $549.6, $945.6, 72%
Utah - $41.5, $65.4, 58%
Vermont - $5.2, $6.7, 29%
Virginia - $96.9, $175.6, 81%
Washington - $79.9, $94.0, 18%
West Virginia - $25.0, $43.3, 73%
Wisconsin - $69.6, $88.5, 27%
Wyoming - $6.4, $11.2, 76%

Average State Increase 96%

more at

Families USA
1201 New York Avenue NW, Suite 1100, Washington, DC 20005; Phone: [phone]
E-mail: [e-mail] ; www.familiesusa.org

http://www.familiesusa.org/assets/pdfs/chipra/funding.pdf

[sandnsea]

6. Oh dear fucking god--The HORROR! Parents will have insurance too!!!

What a bunch of goddamn fuckwits I swear to god. Do any of you have any comprehension how working income people actually live??

[Mass]

8. The OP is not the only one who worries. Casey (PA) has been campaigning hard on the same issue.

So has Rockefeller, and they have said they will continue in conference. The issue is that, by going to the exchange, the copays will increase a lot, making it harder on working families who insured their kids through CHIP and were basically covered totally.

So, I hope and imagine it will be fixed, but this one is not out of the imagination of crazy liberals.

[sandnsea]

10. Most parents will take the co-pays in exchange

for health care. If they're worried about the low income people with kids who are now on SCHIP, then they need to make sure Medicaid is expanded to 150% of poverty. If they did that, and made sure the subsidies were in line with the House bill, they could do away with SCHIP. They can't demand people pay for part of their health care coverage, and then freak out when they discover it's going to hurt financially to pay for part of their health care coverage. The choice for working people is seeing the doctor - or not. In places where they won't see you without cash or an insurance card, this means life and death. I don't think too many people have ever really been faced with that.

[pinto]

7. My short answer - CHIPRA provided an average increase of 96% in Fed funds to States through 2013.

And I expect it will be reauthorized in that Legislative year.

These folks would have more info - www.familiesusa.org

http://www.familiesusa.org/assets/pdfs/chipra/funding.pdf

[ncteechur]

9. sChip is still subject to annual federal budgets. Calm down.

[jwirr]

11. That should not be a surprise. Medicaid in many states have required

their enrollees to choose insurance plans similar to Medicare D. Minnesota Care also is insurance based. Here in MN since Pawlenty got in we have all been switched to insurance companies. I only hope that we get a Democratic Governor who will reverse that next year. There is no comparison between what was and what Pawlenty has done. He has done everything he can to destroy the wonderful programs that we used to have.