The family liaison at Goldrick Elementary School, Mary Grace, said families came to her office last week “freaking out.” A handful of parents showed her a letter from the state. It read: If Congress does not renew federal funding, Child Health Plan Plus will end on January 31, 2018.
Some students at Goldrick in Colorado receive health insurance through CHP+ or the state’s Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). A majority of students at the Southwest Denv...
health care
On World AIDS Day, remember all evidence suggests Trump still has zero plans to tackle HIV/AIDS
“Bringing down the rate of HIV infection is one of the United States’ great public health triumphs of the past quarter-century,” wrote Keith Humphreys, who served as senior policy adviser at the White House drug policy office from 2009 to 2010.
Approximately 1.2 million residents nationwide are living with HIV, and HIV/AIDS deaths have significantly dropped. Between 2000 and 2013 in the United States, deaths decreased by 2.8 percent annually, faster than the global average of 1.5 pe...
Insurance officials: ‘Anything is possible’ in Obamcare market with no mandate, even insurer exits
This open enrollment period, residents in many states across the country have only one or two insurer options if they purchase plans on the Obamacare exchange.
In Delaware, residents have only one. After Aetna announced it was exiting the exchange in May — leaving Highmark as the only company insuring residents who don’t get coverage through work — Delaware Insurance Commissioner Trinidad Navarro said that he “would hope that our elected officials in Washingt...
Trump’s pick for Health Secretary promises to implement Obamacare ‘if it remains’
President Donald Trump’s pick for Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary is a pharmaceutical executive familiar with the department which he is nominated to lead. On Wednesday, before a Senate committee on health, Alex Azar defended his past: law clerk for Justice Antonin Scalia, HHS General Counsel and Deputy Secretary under President George W. Bush, and executive to drug giant Eli Lilly.
Since Trump came to office, HHS has undermined the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and hind...
The GOP has a problem with paying for kids’ basic care
Fifty-six days after Congress failed to fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), some American children are at risk of losing their health insurance. The deadline to renew the program’s funding was Sept. 30, and Congress hasn’t granted the program $15 billion to continue.
As a result, the popular state-level insurance program for low-income children and pregnant women is facing a funding cliff. While some states may be able to keep the program going thr...
How one GOP senator went from saving Obamacare to being OK with undermining it
Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) casted a pivotal vote over the summer, where she — along with Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME) and John McCain (R-AZ) — saved the Affordable Care Act (ACA) from being repealed. She didn’t just vote against repeal once; she voted against three different G.O.P. health bills and shot down another in September.
But on Tuesday, she said she supports legislation that most health experts say will undermine the current health law. In an op-ed in the...
Murkowski ready to prioritize Arctic drilling over healthcare
In an op-ed published in a local Alaskan paper last week, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) announced that she supports repealing the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate, saying that she “always supported the freedom to choose.”
Murkowski was a key vote in stopping repeal of the Affordable Care Act earlier this year, but there’s one crucial difference this time around: repealing the individual mandate is tied to the Republican’s tax bill, which also inclu...
Obamacare’s most unpopular provision is important. Here’s why.
Jim Cooke is looking to purchase health insurance this open enrollment period on Maryland Health Connection, the state’s Obamacare exchange. He usually pays the penalty for not having insurance, due to the individual mandate under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). But for him, this year is different.
“It’s not urgent, I’d just feel more comfortable,” Cooke told ThinkProgress. “I’m 61 now, and I think I better have this coverage.”
C...