AAMC Executive Vice President Atul Grover, MD, PhD, April 12 sent a letter to Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) endorsing the States Achieve Medicaid Expansion (SAME) Act (S. 2787). Under this bill, all states would receive three full years of federal matching funding to expand their Medicaid population, regardless of when the expansion occurs.
In the letter, Dr. Grover notes, “We applaud the 30 states and Washington, D.C. that have already opted to expand Medicaid coverage to all individuals earning up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level.” He continues, “In these 30 states, AAMC member institutions and their faculty practice plans have been able to treat more patients in outpatient settings before their conditions become urgent – improving health outcomes for patients and stabilizing hospitals serving the most vulnerable populations.”
Under current law, states that choose to expand coverage after 2014 do not receive the same federal matching rates as those that originally expanded under the Affordable Care Act (ACA, P.L. 111-148 and P.L. 111-152). If passed, this bill would allow states to receive three years of full federal funding, phasing down to a 90 percent match rate for the sixth year of the expansion and in subsequent years.
Dr. Grover added, “The AAMC continues to encourage the remaining 20 states to expand Medicaid coverage, and the SAME Act makes this option more affordable and more compelling.”