House Republican leader says Medicaid expansion would endanger disabled Kansans

Editor’s note: The following was submitted in rebuttal to an April 27 guest column by Cammie Funston titled “Mom: Disabled need help on health care and Schmidt’s in the way”

Imagine that you’re one of the more than half a million Kansans with a disability.

What would it mean for you if our state expanded Medicaid? It would mean your care is now in jeopardy.

That’s because Medicaid expansion has nothing to do with individuals with disabilities. It’s about adding able-bodied adults to the program.

It does not increase benefits or level of care for traditional Medicaid enrollees. It simply results in the same resources being spread more thinly across an ever-growing population.

The result is limited resources being siphoned away from a reservoir intended to assist our most vulnerable populations to fund coverage for able-bodied adults. Many of these able-bodied adults are already eligible for subsidized health insurance through the health care exchange or plans provided by their employers.

Kansans with disabilities, pregnant women, children in foster care, seniors — these are our neighbors and the individuals currently covered by Medicaid. The programs that serve them need protection.

Despite rhetoric from the left that ignores reality, the hard truth is that Medicaid expansion in Kansas will result in the same outcome as it has in every other state where it has been implemented.

Enrollment projections in expansion states have been repeatedly shattered. States often end up adding two to four times as many people to the program than originally anticipated. By extension, costs shatter projections and crowd out other state budgets priorities.

Twenty-four states spend more than one-quarter of their budgets on Medicaid — and our neighbor, Colorado, shattered their enrollment estimates by 139 percent. This means states have less to spend on things like education and public safety, as funding a welfare program for able bodied adults continues to grow and crowd out other priorities.

Particularly distressing is the reality that Medicaid expansion can make waiting lists even longer. Home and community-based services waivers enable those with chronic debilitating conditions to receive additional care at home.

But once these state programs reach an enrollment cap, individuals languish on waiting lists as their hopes dim that the care they desperately need becomes further and further from reach. Horrifyingly, more than 22,000 individuals have died on Medicaid waiting lists in expansion states since ObamaCare’s beginning.

For able-bodied Kansans without dependents who would be added to Medicaid rolls, the situation is not much better. Thousands of low-income Kansans living between 100 and 150 percent of the federal poverty level are already eligible for subsidized silver-level, private health insurance plans on the exchange. Those private plans offer higher-quality care and are accepted by more providers. Expansion would take away their private insurance and force them into a state-run welfare program.

The outcome is just as bleak for health care providers. Studies reveal hospitals in expansion states are no better off financially than those in non-expansion states. Medicaid’s reimbursement rate is two-thirds less than that of private insurance. As hospitals accept more Medicaid patients, they begin to see diminishing returns resulting in budget cuts, layoffs, and in some cases closure of hospitals — especially in rural communities.

As part of our duty to serve the people of Kansas, my colleagues and I will absolutely stand in the way of such a policy that puts the health care of our state’s most vulnerable people in jeopardy, forces thousands of others off private insurance, and places an unsustainable financial burden on our hospitals and the communities they serve. To do otherwise would be to betray our neighbors — the very people we were elected to represent well.

This story was originally published May 2, 2022 at 12:00 AM.