Two senior staff members of Greenwood Leflore Hospital are in favor of Mississippi expanding its Medicaid program, saying that the expansion would not only benefit the hospital but also increase health care services to people who can not afford them.
Jason Studley
“This is very important to our hospital. It’s very important to our county, to the city, to Mississippi as a whole,” Jason Studley, the hospital’s CEO, told the Greenwood Voters League Wednesday night. Dr. John Lucas III, a surgeon, also spoke.
Medicaid is a federal and state health insurance program, paid for by the federal government and state governments and administered individually by each state, designed to help people with low incomes. The federal government pays 84.5% of Mississippi’s Medicaid expenses, according to the Associated Press.
President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, signed into law in 2010, provided states the option of expanding Medicaid coverage to low-income workers who do not have health insurance, with the federal government paying 90% of the expenses and the states making up the rest, according to the AP.
“We’re losing a billion dollars a year,” said state Sen. David Jordan, president of the Voters League and an advocate of Medicaid expansion. “That’s a lot of money. Hospitals need those resources to lubricate the wheels of the hospital to make it run more smoothly and get more resources.”
Studley and Lucas shared similar assessments.
Dr. John Lucas III
Lucas said that Greenwood Leflore Hospital will always be available to take care of patients who don’t have insurance. However, “unfortunately the hospital is not getting reimbursed for that, and that’s to the detriment of our ability to invest in new technology and invest in services that are for the benefit for our community,” he said. “So, I’m totally with Sen. Jordan in supporting our state expanding Medicaid to the full extent that the federal government allows that to happen.”
Currently, patients without health insurance who have with chronic conditions are postponing their care, Studley said. Their conditions eventually turn into acute conditions and they are forced to come to the hospital.
“The hospital is paying the bills for these individuals because their chronic conditions could be managed at an outpatient setting if they had the proper Medicaid coverage,” he said.
Medicaid expansion in Mississippi means that those who make less than 138% of the federal poverty level, which in the case of Leflore County roughly translates to less than $18,000 a year, would be covered, Studley said.
“It’s really imperative that we push forward with Medicaid expansion in the Delta region,” he said.
Gov. Tate Reeves has maintained a strong opposition to Medicaid expansion.
Lucas said one way to attempt to persuade the governor is to encourage state politicians, who would then encourage the governor to support expansion.
- Contact Gerard Edic at 581-7239 or gedic@gwcommonwealth.com.
