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Our Scorecard ranks every state’s health care system based on how well it provides high-quality, accessible, and equitable health care. Read the report to see health care rankings by state.

February 27, 2017

Headlines in Health Policy 45a05c56-9bd3-44cc-a752-e5b9737309fa

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Achieving Universal Coverage

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QUOTABLE

"I understand that there was an initial effort by House Republicans to, for example, phase out Medicaid expansion, which means phasing out coverage. That is a very, very bad idea, because we cannot turn our back on the most vulnerable. We can give them the coverage, reform the program, save some money, and make sure that we live in a country where people are going to say, ‘At least somebody is looking out for me.'" 

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Controlling Health Care Costs

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Repeal, Replace, Fix

  • Leaked GOP Obamacare Replacement Shrinks Subsidies, Medicaid Expansion Politico by Paul Demko—A draft House Republican repeal bill would dismantle the Obamacare subsidies and scrap its Medicaid expansion, according to a copy of the proposal obtained by POLITICO. The legislation would take down the foundation of Obamacare, including the individual mandate, subsidies based on people's income, and all of the law's taxes. 

  • GOP Health Plan: Lower Costs, Better Care, or Road to Ruin? AP by Alan Fram—Top House Republicans say their outline for replacing President Barack Obama's health care law is a pathway to greater flexibility and lower costs for consumers. Democrats see a road to ruin for millions who'd face lost coverage and higher medical expenses, particularly the poor.

  • Repeal of Health Law Faces Obstacles in House, Not Just in Senate New York Times by Jennifer Steinhauer—Ever since Republicans got down to the business of repealing the Affordable Care Act, the Senate has been singled out as the likely problem. Any plan that could zoom through the House would hit roadblocks among Senate Republicans, many of whom have resisted a wholesale repeal of the health law without a robust replacement plan. But after weeks of loud protests, boisterous town hall meetings and scores of quieter meetings with health care professionals, patients, caregivers and hospital managers in their districts, it is becoming increasingly likely that a consensus in the House may be just as hard to reach.

  • Trump Vowed to Protect the Safety Net. What If His Appointees Disagree? New York Times by Yamiche Alcindor—When President Trump addresses Congress this Tuesday and follows the speech with a budget blueprint for the fiscal year that begins in October, his White House will finally address in concrete numbers one of his central contradictions: He campaigned as the populist protector of programs for the working class, yet he has pledged to control the budget deficit, cut spending and cut taxes. Moreover, Mr. Trump has surrounded himself with traditional small-government conservatives bent on cutting back or eliminating many of the programs he has championed. Former Representative Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina, for example, the new White House budget director, has called Social Security a "Ponzi scheme".

  • Obamacare Fix Hinges on Medicaid Clash in Senate The Hill by Alexander Bolton—The most divisive issue for Senate Republicans when it comes to repealing and replacing ­Obamacare is what to do with Medicaid. The Affordable Care Act gave states the option of accepting federal funds to expand Medicaid, the health care program for the poor and disabled. Millions of people gained health insurance after 31 states—including many with Republican governors—decided to accept the deal. 

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Achieving Universal Coverage

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Affordable Care Act Enrollee Stories: The Law at Work

Darla Volgamore received insurance through the ACA.

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Controlling Health Care Costs

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Medicaid Cuts

  • Kasich: House GOP Medicaid Plan 'Very Bad Idea' The Hill by Peter Sullivan—Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich on Sunday criticized the House Republicans' plan to phase out Obamacare's expansion of Medicaid. "That is a very, very bad idea, because we cannot turn our back on the most vulnerable. We can give them the coverage, reform the program, save some money and make sure that we live in a country where people are going to say, 'At least somebody is looking out for me.'" 

  • GOP Governors Confront Medicaid Divide The Hill by Peter Sullivan—Governors are descending on Washington this weekend as Republicans wrestle with the future of Obamacare's expansion of Medicaid. GOP lawmakers say they are looking to governors for advice on what to do about the program, which is one of the toughest issues Republicans face as they look to repeal and replace the healthcare law. Many of the lawmakers representing states that accepted the Medicaid expansion are looking to keep it. 

  • Federal Block Grants Have Been a Big Financial Loser for the States Fiscal Times by Eric Pianin—A key element of the Republicans' plan for replacing Obamacare is transforming the costly Medicaid program into a series of block grants to the states. The idea is to save the federal government billions of dollars in the coming years while giving state officials more flexibility to set eligibility requirements and spending levels to provide health care services to the nation's poor and disabled. But there is one serious catch: While the extensive use of block grants has proven over the years to be a great financial boon for Congress and the federal government in attempting to rein in spending, it has been a bad deal for the states and hundreds of millions of Americans dependent on federal assistance. 

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Improving Health Care Quality

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Town Hall

  • Congress Goes Home, and Constituents Fired Up Over Health Care Are Waiting New York Times by By Kate Zernike and Alexander Burns—As Republican lawmakers prepare to leave Washington for a weeklong congressional recess, liberal groups and Democratic Party organizers are hoping to make their homecoming as noisy and uncomfortable as possible. But national organizers concede they are playing catch-up to a "dam-bursting level" of grassroots activism that has bubbled up from street protests and the small groups that have swelled into crowds outside local congressional offices. 

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Controlling Health Care Costs

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Insurance Industry

  • Filing Extension May Not Be Enough to Keep Insurers in Individual Market Modern Healthcare by Virgil Dickson—Health insurers are pleased the Trump administration wants to give them seven extra weeks to file rates for individual market plans in 2018. But that move does little to settle their uncertainty about whether to offer plans at all. Their anxiety has been heightened by the Republican drive to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act and by a pending House Republican lawsuit to block certain payments to insurers. Carriers say they need to know the rules of any new system before they can design plans and set rates. 

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Improving Health Care Quality

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Public Health

  • U.S. Life Expectancy Will Soon Be on Par with Mexico's and the Czech Republic's  Washington Post by Lenny Bernstein—Life expectancy at birth will continue to climb substantially for residents of industrialized nations—but not in the United States, where minimal gains will soon put life spans on par with those in Mexico and the Czech Republic, according to an extensive analysis released Tuesday. The reasons for the United States' lag are well known. It has the highest infant and maternal mortality rates of any of the countries in the study, and the highest obesity rate. It is the only one without universal health insurance coverage and has the "largest share of unmet health-care needs due to financial costs," the researchers wrote.

  • Fatal Drug Overdoses in U.S. on the Rise, CDC Says Stat by Andrew Joseph—Fatal drug overdoses continued their depressing climb in 2015, while the opioid crisis shifts from taking lives with painkillers like oxycodone to more lethal compounds like heroin and fentanyl, new data released Friday show. Overall, the rate of fatal overdoses from all drugs has increased more than 2.5 times since 1999, rising from 6.1 deaths per 100,000 people then to 16.3 deaths in 2015, according to the new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 

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