Changes in Health Insurance Status over a Two-Year Period May 29, 2010 Issue Brief The ability to maintain health insurance in the face of rising costs and an uncertain economy is a key concern for families and featured prominently in the health reform debate. While the percentage of the population without coverage at any one time changes by only a relatively small amount over…
Health Reform Issues: Key Issues About State Financing and Medicaid May 28, 2010 Issue Brief This updated issue brief from the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured examines key issues related to state financing and the expansion of the Medicaid program under the new health reform law. Issue Brief (.pdf)
New Report Provides State-Level Data on Coverage Gains and Costs of the Medicaid Expansion in Health Reform May 26, 2010 News Release Analysis Projects Steep Decreases in Uninsured, With Federal Government Covering Vast Majority of Costs WASHINGTON — The expansion of Medicaid under the new health reform law will significantly increase the number of people covered by the program and markedly reduce the uninsured in states across the country, with the federal…
Pulling it Together: REPOR(t) May 26, 2010 Perspective In today’s column I investigate a somewhat lighter topic than my last column on micro-simulation modeling: What was the impact of shows like Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show and Stephen Colbert’s The Colbert Report on the health reform debate? Who among us has not wondered about the answer to this…
Confusion Declines, but Remains Widespread in KFF May Tracking Poll May 16, 2010 Perspective Confusion over the new health reform law declined but remains widespread, with 44 percent of the public saying they were confused in May, compared to 55 percent in April. Moreover, more than a third of Americans (35%) say they do not understand what the impact of the law will be…
How Will Health Reform Impact Young Adults? May 13, 2010 Issue Brief Adults ages 19 to 29 have the highest uninsured rate of any age group in the United States. The 13.7 million uninsured people in this age group comprise nearly a third of the overall uninsured population. Most provisions in health reform do not specifically target young adults, but because of their…
What’s in There? The New Health Reform Law and Medicare May 7, 2010 Event As part of an ongoing series to explore what is in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, this May 7 briefing sponsored by the Alliance for Health Reform and the Kaiser Family Foundation examines how the reform law affects…
Explaining Health Care Reform: Questions About the Extension of Dependent Coverage to Age 26 May 5, 2010 Issue Brief The new health reform law requires private health insurers that offer dependent coverage to children to allow young adults up to age 26 to remain on their parent’s insurance plan. This provision is among the first in the reform law to take effect, and it increases the availability of insurance…
Pulling It Together: Predicting the Future May 4, 2010 Perspective A fair amount of attention was given recently to projections made by the Chief Actuary of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) about the new health reform law, and how they compare to previous estimates by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). No doubt the various projections will be…
Optimizing Medicaid Enrollment: Perspectives on Strengthening Medicaid’s Reach Under Health Care Reform May 3, 2010 Issue Brief The health reform law creates a national plan for near-universal health coverage that relies on a large expansion of Medicaid eligibility as its foundation. This brief draws on recent interviews with Medicaid program directors and other experts about the opportunities that health reform presents to optimize Medicaid by strengthening its…