March 21, 2024

DeSantis signs bills aimed at health care access, but they do little to help uninsured

Alexandra Glorioso and Michelle Marchante write:

"TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Ron DeSantis signed on Thursday the first four of six bills from a $1.1 billion package that improves health care for most Floridians who already have insurance but does little to provide treatment for the state’s quarter-of-a-million-plus uninsured patients.

...

But Holly Bullard, chief strategy and development officer for Florida Policy Institute [emphasis added], one of the groups leading the effort to get Medicaid expansion on the 2026 ballot as a state constitutional amendment, told the Herald the Milliman study was “incomplete and misleading.”

The Milliman report excluded “hundreds of millions in savings,” Bullard said. She said her organization estimated that Medicaid expansion would in fact save Florida $200 million per year.

“It’s very concerning that a report commissioned by the state of Florida using taxpayer dollars would be so glaring in omitting so many of the well-known budget savings categories that the 40 states that have expanded Medicaid have benefited from. Florida’s budget spending on mental health services, corrections, substance abuse, people who have cancer or AIDs, and many other programs would see budget savings under expansion,” Bullard said in a statement. “This is Medicaid finance 101.”"

Read more on tampabay.com

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