State Medicaid programs respond to meet COVID-19 challenges: results from a 50-state Medicaid budget survey for state fiscal years 2020 and 2021
- Collection:
- Health Policy and Services Research
- Author(s):
- Gifford, Kathleen, author Lashbrook, Aimee, author Barth, Sarah, author Hinton, Elizabeth, author Rudowitz, Robin, author Guth, Madeline, author Stolyar, Lina, author
- Contributor(s):
- Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, issuing body.
- Publication:
- San Francisco, CA : Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, October 2020
- Language(s):
- English
- Format:
- Text
- Subject(s):
- COVID-19 -- economics Medicaid -- organization & administration Budgets State Government United States
- Genre(s):
- Technical Report
- Abstract:
- The coronavirus pandemic has generated both a public health crisis and an economic crisis, with major implications for Medicaid, a countercyclical program. During economic downturns, more people enroll in Medicaid, increasing program spending at the same time state tax revenues may be falling. As demand increases and state revenues decline, states face difficult budget decisions to meet balanced budget requirements. To help both support Medicaid and provide broad fiscal relief, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) authorized a 6.2 percentage point increase in the federal match rate ("FMAP") (retroactive to January 1, 2020) available if states meet certain "maintenance of eligibility" (MOE) requirements. The fiscal relief is in place until the end of the quarter in which the Public Health Emergency (PHE) ends. The current PHE is in effect through January 21, 2021 which means the enhanced FMAP is slated to expire at the end of March 2021 unless the PHE is renewed. States ended state fiscal year (FY) 2020 and adopted budgets and policies for FY 2021, which began on July 1 for most states, while faced with uncertainty about the pandemic, the economy, and the duration of the PHE. This report examines Medicaid policy trends with a focus on planned changes for FY 2021 based on data provided by state Medicaid directors as part of the 20th annual survey of Medicaid directors in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Unlike previous years, the survey instrument was modified to primarily collect information about policy changes planned for FY 2021, especially policies related to responding to the pandemic. Overall, 43 states responded to the survey by mid-August 2020, although response rates for specific questions varied. Key findings suggest that most policy changes and issues identified for FY 2021 were related to responding to the COVID-19 PHE (Figure 1).
- Copyright:
- Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further use of the material is subject to CC BY license. (More information)
- Extent:
- 1 online resource (1 PDF file (iii, 56 pages))
- Illustrations:
- Illustrations
- NLM Unique ID:
- 9918230987906676 (See catalog record)
- Permanent Link:
- http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/9918230987906676