{"id":1370,"date":"2023-06-08T18:38:37","date_gmt":"2023-06-08T18:38:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/?p=1370"},"modified":"2023-06-08T18:38:37","modified_gmt":"2023-06-08T18:38:37","slug":"debt-deal-leaves-health-programs-mostly-intact","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/?p=1370","title":{"rendered":"Debt Deal Leaves Health Programs (Mostly) Intact"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div class=\"wp-block-people block--people\">\n<h3 class=\"people-title\">\n\t\tThe Host\t<\/h3>\n<div class=\"people-card-container single\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-people-card block--people-card\">\n<div class=\"author-image-container\">\n\t\t\t<img srcset=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg 600w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=150,150 150w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=500,500 500w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=480,480 480w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=100,100 100w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=120,120 120w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=170,170 170w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=300,300 300w, https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/12\/Rovner-Julie2022_sq.jpg?resize=315,315 315w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 480px) 100vw, 150px\"\/>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>A final deal cut between President Joe Biden and House Republicans extends the U.S. debt ceiling deadline to 2025 and reins in some spending. The bill signed into law by the president will preserve many programs at their current funding levels, and Democrats were able to prevent any changes to the Medicare and Medicaid programs.<\/p>\n<p>Still, millions of Americans are likely to lose their Medicaid coverage this year as states are once again allowed to redetermine who is eligible and who is not; Medicaid rolls were frozen for three years due to the pandemic. Data from states that have begun to disenroll people suggests that the vast majority of those losing insurance are not those who are no longer eligible, but instead people who failed to complete required paperwork \u2014 if they received it in the first place.<\/p>\n<p>This week\u2019s panelists are Julie Rovner of KFF Health News, Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico, Lauren Weber of The Washington Post, and Jessie Hellmann of CQ Roll Call.<\/p>\n<p>Among the takeaways from this week\u2019s episode:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Lawmakers and White House officials spared health programs from substantial spending cuts in a last-minute agreement to raise the nation\u2019s debt ceiling. And Biden named Mandy Cohen, a former North Carolina health director who worked in the Obama administration, to be the next director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Though she lacks academic credentials in infectious diseases, Cohen enters the job with a reputation as someone who can listen and be listened to by both Democrats and Republicans.<\/li>\n<li>The removal of many Americans from the Medicaid program, post-public health emergency, is going as expected: With hundreds of thousands already stripped from the rolls, most have been deemed ineligible not because they don\u2019t meet the criteria, but because they failed to file the proper paperwork in time. Nearly 95 million people were on Medicaid before the unwinding began.<\/li>\n<li>Eastern and now southern parts of the United States are experiencing hazardous air quality conditions as wildfire smoke drifts from Canada, raising the urgency surrounding conversations about the health effects of climate change.<\/li>\n<li>The drugmaker Merck &amp; Co. sued the federal government this week, challenging its ability to press drugmakers into negotiations over what Medicare will pay for some of the most expensive drugs. Experts predict Merck\u2019s coercion argument could fall flat because drugmakers voluntarily choose to participate in Medicare, though it is unlikely this will be the last lawsuit over the issue.<\/li>\n<li>In abortion news, some doctors are pushing back against the Indiana medical board\u2019s decision to reprimand and fine an OB-GYN who spoke out about providing an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio. The doctors argue the decision could set a bad precedent and suppress doctors\u2019 efforts to communicate with the public about health issues.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Also this week, Rovner interviews KFF Health News senior correspondent Sarah Jane Tribble, who reported the latest KFF Health News-NPR \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/news\/tag\/bill-of-the-month\/\">Bill of the Month<\/a>\u201d feature, about a patient with Swiss health insurance who experienced the sticker shock of the U.S. health care system after an emergency appendectomy. If you have an outrageous or exorbitant medical bill you want to share with us, <a href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/send-us-your-medical-bills\/\">you can do that here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block block--newsletter  \" data-type=\"kaiser-health-news\/newsletter\" data-align=\"center\" style=\"\">\n<h4 class=\"newsletter__title\">\n\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/email-signup\/\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tEmail Sign-Up\t\t<\/a><br \/>\n\t<\/h4>\n<p class=\"newsletter__description\">\n\t\tSubscribe to KFF Health News&#8217; free Morning Briefing.\t<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Plus, for \u201cextra credit,\u201d the panelists suggest health policy stories they read this week that they think you should read, too:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Julie Rovner:<\/strong> The New York Times\u2019 \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2023\/06\/01\/business\/allina-health-hospital-debt.html#:~:text=Allina%20has%20an%20explicit%20policy,least%20%244%2C500%20of%20unpaid%20debt.\">This Nonprofit Health System Cuts Off Patients With Medical Debt<\/a>,\u201d by Sarah Kliff and Jessica Silver-Greenberg.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jessie Hellmann:<\/strong> MLive\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlive.com\/news\/2023\/06\/during-the-darkest-days-of-covid-some-michigan-hospitals-made-100s-of-millions.html\">During the Darkest Days of COVID, Some Michigan Hospitals Made 100s of Millions<\/a>,\u201d by Matthew Miller and Danielle Salisbury.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Joanne Kenen:<\/strong> Politico Magazine\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/magazine\/2023\/06\/06\/hospital-climate-change-waste-00098612\">Can Hospitals Turn Into Climate Change Fighting Machines?<\/a>\u201d by Joanne Kenen.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Lauren Weber:<\/strong> The Washington Post\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/weather\/2023\/06\/07\/wildfire-smoke-health-impact-climate-change\/\">Smoke Brings a Warning: There\u2019s No Escaping Climate\u2019s Threat to Health<\/a>,\u201d by Dan Diamond, Joshua Partlow, Brady Dennis, and Emmanuel Felton.<\/p>\n<p>Also mentioned in this week\u2019s episode:<\/p>\n<p>KFF Health News\u2019 \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/news\/article\/medicaid-unwinding-state-data-coverage-loss\/\">As Medicaid Purge Begins, \u2018Staggering Numbers\u2019 of Americans Lose Coverage<\/a>,\u201d by Hannah Recht.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n<p><em>To hear all our podcasts,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/news\/tag\/podcast\/\">click here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>And subscribe to KFF Health News\u2019 \u2018What the Health? on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/32EdsB662C3oyIrqLMmBXI?si=TQhRjzzLTgWtK3crfbOFtA\">Spotify<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/what-the-health\/id1253607372?mt=2\">Apple Podcasts<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.stitcher.com\/podcast\/kaiser-health-news\/what-the-health\">Stitcher<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/play.pocketcasts.com\/web\/podcasts\/a379e280-3f57-0135-9028-63f4b61a9224\">Pocket Casts<\/a>, or wherever you listen to podcasts.<\/em><\/p>\n<section class=\"block--category-tag-list \">\n<div class=\"category-tag-list__content-wrapper\">\n<h3 class=\"block--category-tag-list__title\">\n\t\t\t\tRelated Topics\t\t\t<\/h3>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<a class=\"category-tag-list__contact-link\" href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/contact-us\/\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tContact Us\t\t<\/a><br \/>\n\t\t<a class=\"category-tag-list__tip-link\" href=\"https:\/\/kffhealthnews.org\/tips\/\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tSubmit a Story Tip\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Host A final deal cut between President Joe Biden and House Republicans extends the U.S. debt ceiling deadline to 2025 and reins in some spending. The bill signed into law by the president will preserve many programs at their current funding levels, and Democrats were able to prevent any changes to the Medicare and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1118,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pharmaceuticals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1370"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1371,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1370\/revisions\/1371"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}