GAO: People in non-Medicaid expansion states more likely to forgo medical care

People with low incomes in states that haven’t expanded Medicaid are much more likely to forgo needed medical care than the poor in other states, according to a government report released Monday (Source: “Study: Without Medicaid expansion, poor forgo medical care,” Associated Press via Columbus Dispatch, Oct. 15, 2018).

The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office worked with the National Center for Health Statistics to analyze federal survey data from 2016. The research focused on adults ages 19-64 with lower incomes in states that did not expand Medicaid under the Obama-era Affordable Care Act, compared to their peers in states that did.

Among the report’s findings:

• Nearly 20 percent of people with low incomes in states that did not expand Medicaid said they passed up needed medical care in the past 12 months because they couldn’t afford it. That compared to 9.4 percent in states that expanded the program.
• About 8 percent of those in states that did not expand Medicaid reported they either skipped medication doses to save money or took less medication than prescribed. That compared to about 5 percent in states that expanded. For people with chronic conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes and asthma, staying on a medication schedule is considered essential.
• About 22 percent of those in states not expanding Medicaid said they needed but could not afford dental care, as compared to 15 percent of similar low-income adults in expansion states.