(L)ast summer’s 5-4 ruling by the Supreme Court in the healthcare case found that states do not have to expand Medicaid. Though the law’s so-called individual mandate—which requires all uninsured Americans to acquire healthcare or face a tax penalty—grabbed media headlines and absorbed political attention, MEDICAID IS ACTUALLY WHAT MATTERS MOST FOR HISTORICALLY MARGINALIZED COMMUNITIES. The legal issue is that Medicaid, despite being funded overwhelmingly by the federal government, is technically a state-by-state partnership. Under the Affordable Care Act, 100 percent of the Medicaid expansion would have been paid for by Washington until 2019 and 90 percent thereafter. But as a voluntary collaboration between the states and the federal government, the court held that Medicaid cannot be forced open. Whatever the legal rationale, the blunt fact is that the court’s opinion and the ensuing political free-for-all leaves the growth of Medicaid in a lurch and places fundamental issues of fairness at the heart of Obamacare’s implementation. The program’s importance to communities of color is hard to overstate. As the Kaiser Family Foundation points out, “Medicaid enables Blacks and Hispanic Americans to access health care.” This statement is not an exaggeration: one out of three African Americans and Latinos receive healthcare through Medicaid. By ruling that governors and state legislatures can opt out of Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, the court opened the door for conservative-led states to head for the exits. They have done just that. Only 24 states will broaden access to the program on Oct. 1. According to Kaiser, this will mean up to six out of 10 people who are eligible for Medicaid will remain excluded. The racial justice implication of Medicaid’s hobbled growth is stark. Nine out of the 13 Southern states, a region where more than half of all blacks reside, will not expand Medicaid. Texas, with the second largest population of Latinos in the country, is counted amongst them. - Imara Jones, in ColorLines
Posted on: Mon, 07 Oct 2013 16:14:20 +0000
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