Posted on 04/04/2014 6:56:25 PM PDT by Jim Robinson
WASHINGTON – The Obama administration often touts that people with pre-existing conditions and countless others can now get covered under ObamaCare. But there's another group that's starting to benefit from the law -- prison inmates.
Cash-strapped state and local prisons increasingly are using the Affordable Care Act to pay for their inmates' medical costs, taking advantage of a little-known provision that lets them shift some of those expenses to the federal government.
Ohio, Illinois and Iowa are among the states trying to offload the rising costs of health care – which include mental health programs – by enrolling inmates into a new expanded Medicaid program when they get sick.
But it doesn't stop there. The states also are working to enroll them even before they're released from prison, so they have coverage when they get out.
Currently, 26 states and the District of Columbia are proceeding with a Medicaid expansion which allows them to extend medical coverage to single and childless adults. Jail operators in at least a half-dozen of those states are then, using that criteria, extending coverage to inmates. The shift means the federal government would pay some emergency costs that used to be entirely covered by the states and counties -- plus, inmates are starting to get coverage for when they leave.
Proponents of shifting prisoners into the expanded Medicaid -- in turn giving them access to health care, including mental health and rehab services, when they are released -- say this reduces recidivism. Others, though, argue that federal taxpayer dollars shouldn’t be used to foot the multibillion dollar bill.
“The political element of ObamCare is that we were helping what we called the deserving poor or what we used to call the deserving poor...
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Protecting his national security force
Oh never mind..
Any state that doesn’t want to shift its costs to the Feds is a sucker.
Might as well take full advantage of Obamacare as long as its on the books.
A quick way to pump up the numbers by 1 1/2 million.
Obama got his numbers by enrolling prisoners?
More non-paying #covered. Got it.
What does that make the percent covered to those actually paying, now?
Medicaid is going to turn into an even bigger fiscal disaster than it already is.
Obama probably got a million from the prison system. Lucky for Obama the suck ups in the press will keep the lid on this for him.
And the MSM wonders why so few people trust them...
Further increasing the size, and scope of the Federal government is part of the Leftist agenda. Centralizing the governance of the Nation by taking more from the States to D.C.
That would be a great question to ask Jay the Carney.
1. Are some prisoners being put into healthcare exchanges?
2. How many of the 7 million enrollees are Federal and state detainees?
“...shift some of those expenses to the federal government.”
Taxpayers in the 50 states pay for the federal government.
There is no “cost shifting.”
@mike......about one million
I would imagine that there’s a full-time employee at every state prison now....to put new “team-members” onto the system....as they step through the door. You can figure that it’s saving billions across the US on the state’s cost situation. The negative is that we....the tax payer....are covering these guys entirely.
Great! A Rat Tax!
Shut up and pay, taxpeasants.
Ya got 10 days to pony up whut ya "owes".
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