Commentary

On April 2, 2024, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released the final Notice of Benefit and Payment Parameters (NBPP) for 2025. This annual rule governs core provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), including operation of the health insurance Marketplaces, standards for health plans, insurance brokers (including web-brokers), and the risk adjustment program. This blog focuses on provisions of the final rule of interest to state officials.

Commentary

This commentary discusses how Medicaid supported Ashley in taking control of her health and getting the help she needed after she unexpectedly lost her private health coverage. That’s Medicaid shares stories of people covered by Medicaid at critical points in their lives, underscoring the importance of stable health insurance coverage to building a nationwide Culture of Health.

Commentary

This commentary shares how Medicaid supported Milly throughout her pregnancy. That’s Medicaid shares stories of people covered by Medicaid at critical points in their lives, underscoring the importance of stable health insurance coverage to building a nationwide Culture of Health.

Commentary

This commentary tells the story of Danielle, whose small business struggled in the opening months of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to trying to keep her business afloat, Danielle also had to care for her son and home school him. Medicaid provided Daneille with the mental health support needed to keep moving forward during an incredibly challenging period. 

That’s Medicaid shares stories of people covered by Medicaid at critical points in their lives, underscoring the importance of stable health insurance coverage to building a nationwide Culture of Health.

Commentary

This commentary tells the story of Adrian, who works with the Medicaid-funded Mississippi Youth Programs Around the Clock program. Adrian's work provides youth and their families with needed "wraparound" services to cultivate healthier communities.

That’s Medicaid shares stories of people covered by Medicaid at critical points in their lives, underscoring the importance of stable health insurance coverage to building a nationwide Culture of Health.

Brief

This update to the methodology documentation for the Urban Institute’s Health Insurance Policy Simulation Model explains how they estimated health coverage in 2023, taking into account major uncertain issues such as Medicaid enrollment after the HHS public health emergency and the potential expiration of enhanced premium tax credits for Marketplace coverage in 2023.

Map

This interactive map and chart summarize proposed and approved legislation since 2018, Medicaid waivers, financial estimates, and other initiatives designed to extend coverage during the postpartum period. (Under the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, Medicaid enrollees who typically lose coverage after 60 days postpartum cannot be disenrolled until the end of the month in which the public emergency period ends.)

Blog

At the end of the Pubic Health Emergency, more than 15 million people may become uninsured if they cannot secure alternate sources of health coverage. This blog provides actions states should carefully consider to ensure that stakeholders, including insurers, are facilitating these critical transitions.

Blog

This blog discuss the important role that ACA marketplaces will play in mitigating coverage losses as they prepare for the end of the Public Health Emergency and identifies basic as well as more innovative strategies marketplaces can adopt to help consumers make a smooth transition to affordable, comprehensive coverage.

Commentary

This commentary examines how recent approval of the Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm under the U.S. Food & Drug Administration’s Accelerated Approval Program is controversial for a range of reasons, including its projected impact on state Medicaid budgets which will be required to cover the drug, priced at $56,000 a year, despite inconclusive evidence of its clinical effectiveness. 

Chart

This chart details the amounts and required oversight of COVID-19 federal funds allocated to hospitals, providers, and states by the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (Families First Act), the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), the Paycheck Protection Program and Health Care Enhancement Act (HR 266), the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021, and the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.

Report

CMS approved state work/community engagement (CE) waivers in Arkansas, Indiana, Kentucky, and New Hampshire; and additional states have submitted or are poised to submit similar waivers. This series of charts outlines the legal, policy, financial and operational tasks and issues that states will face in adding a work/CE condition to their Medicaid program.

Report

08.2018 / By Urban Institute

This report investigates the work patterns of Medicaid beneficiaries in Kentucky who are are potentially subject to Medicaid work requirements. It finds that the structure of Kentucky’s Medicaid waiver does not seem to align with the reality of some working enrollees’ lives, and that working enrollees losing coverage may not have access to an employer plan.

Webinar & Presentations

This webinar reviews the Stewart v. Azar decision and potential implications for states with approved, pending or planned Medicaid waivers that include work/community engagement requirements. The court’s findings may shape what analysis will be necessary to demonstrate that future waivers advance the Medicaid statute's objectives.

Webinar & Presentations

Webinar discusses the status of state efforts to secure waivers to use federal Medicaid funding to provide care in Institutions for Mental Disease (IMD), including the requirements states must meet to secure an IMD waiver; the status of requests and approvals; and issues and opportunities arising as states pursue and increasingly implement the IMD waiver.

Report

States continue to identify and pursue strategies to further reduce the number of uninsured to make coverage more affordable for consumers and to improve access to care. This issue brief presents two possible models for a Medicaid buy-in program for states, and details the design considerations and authorities needed to implement each model.

Graphic

This map tracks state Medicaid expansion decisions and approaches states are taking for expanding eligibility to 138 percent of the Federal Poverty Level. It also includes information on state legislative activity around Medicaid expansion, governors’ stances on the issue, and fiscal and demographic analyses from the state or other institutions. For states that are expanding Medicaid, but using an alternative to traditional expansion, the map also contains brief descriptions of these demonstration waivers.

Graphic

In January 2018, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services issued a new policy allowing states to implement work and community engagement requirements for certain Medicaid enrollees. States are permitted to seek federal approval to require non-elderly, non-pregnant, and non-disabled adults to participate in these types of activities to qualify for Medicaid or certain aspects of Medicaid coverage. This chart summarizes states’ pending and approved Section 1115 waivers, waiver renewals, and waiver amendments to implement work and community engagement requirements.

Webinar & Presentations

On January 11, 2018, CMS released guidance for states seeking 1115 waivers that condition Medicaid eligibility on work and community engagement, quickly followed by approval of Kentucky’s 1115 waivers that include these requirements. Both the new guidance and recent waiver approval represent a significant departure from past Administrations’ positions. This webinar reviews the new guidance and discusses state legal, policy, and operational considerations.

Brief

Uncertainty about the future of health insurance options and concern about the ability of Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplaces to offer adequate competition and choice have spurred states to look for new coverage approaches. Innovative strategies states are proposing include allowing consumers to buy into state Medicaid programs and developing state-specific coverage options within the ACA’s framework.

Brief

CMS has signaled a willingness to evaluate new types of Medicaid proposals from states, such as Medicaid waiver applications that include programs to connect individuals to employment or incorporate features of private market coverage. In response to CMS’ letter, some states have developed proposals that include these types of requirements for certain individuals covered by the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion—and a few states are seeking similar changes for their non-Medicaid expansion populations.

Brief

While the focus of debate regarding repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been on Marketplaces and the Medicaid expansion, myriad other provisions of the ACA are at risk of repeal—including those that streamline Medicaid eligibility and enrollment systems and implement a national, simplified standard for income eligibility. As of January 2016, 37 states are able to complete an eligibility determination in real time, defined as less than 24 hours, and among these, 11 states report that at least half of their applicants receive an eligibility determination in real time. The future of the ACA’s streamlined eligibility and enrollment-related provisions and the system improvements states have invested in to implement them are the subject of this issue brief.