Kasich, other governors express concern over U.S. Senate health reform plan

Governors in several states, including Ohio, that opted to expand Medicaid under the ACA are wary of the Senate Republican plan to end the added federal funding for it within seven years (Source: “Governors wary of Medicaid cost shift in Senate health bill,” Associated Press via Columbus Dispatch, June 23, 2017).

The proposal, released Thursday, calls for a slower phase-out of the Medicaid expansion than a bill adopted earlier by the House. Yet it would still force those states to figure out what to do about the millions of lower-income Americans who used it to gain health coverage.

“I have deep concerns with details in the U.S. Senate’s plan to fix America’s health care system and the resources needed to help our most vulnerable, including those who are dealing with drug addiction, mental illness and chronic health problems and have nowhere else to turn,” Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican, said in a Twitter message.

Kasich was part of a group of Republican and Democratic governors who wrote a letter last week to Senate leaders calling for them to work in a bipartisan way to revamp the nation’s complex health insurance policies.