April 21, 2005

Addresses Issue at Washington D.C. Forum

LANSING – Governor Jennifer M. Granholm said today that Congress needs to treat and fund Medicaid as the life-saving and compassionate program it is.
 
“Where are our values as a nation if we are willing to cut health care for some of the most innocent, fragile, and less fortunate citizens in our country?” Granholm asked. “Until we can stop people from getting older, children from being children, and people from being disabled, Medicaid will be critically important and cannot be cut.
 
“In Michigan, we’ve preserved Medicaid despite multi-billion dollar budget crunches, but it has required painful decisions about coverage and reimbursement,” Granholm explained.  “Governors across the nation have been caught in the painful web of choosing between providing health care for grandparents and education for grandchildren, and it is utterly unbearable.”
 
Granholm offered her comments at a forum studying the impact of proposed Medicaid cuts sponsored by the Democratic Policy Council in Washington, D.C.  The Governor, who chairs the National Governors Association’s Health and Human Services Committee, said cutting Medicaid will devastate the states’ ability to fund health care for the vulnerable.

Granholm criticized federal legislation that will penalize states when the federal government begins a prescription drug program for dual eligible citizens in January 2006.

“Governors had hoped that the federal government would realize its responsibility for low income Medicare beneficiaries,” Granholm said.  “Instead, Medicare beneficiaries are scheduled to receive a prescription drug benefit, but states will be on the hook to pay a large chunk of that federal benefit.” 

Granholm encouraged Congress to address the Medicaid funding as part of an overall solution to the growing health care crisis facing the nation.  In addition to preserving Medicaid funding, Granholm urged Congress to adopt a “uniquely American solution” that includes a solution for catastrophic coverage among employers with legacy health care costs as well as a solution for the working poor, those who are employed by companies that do not provide health care benefits.

Nearly 1.4 million Michigan residents – one in seven – depend on the care provided by Medicaid.  The state’s caseload has grown more than 30 percent since 2000, much of it due to the economy, but also due to employers who do not offer health care coverage to employees. 
 
Approximately 85 percent of Medicaid dollars in Michigan pays for care for three groups:  senior citizens, disabled people, and children.  Medicaid also funds uncompensated care in hospitals and is a supplement to Medicare for low income beneficiaries. 
 
Medicaid is the largest health care program in our country, serving more than 50 million people and covering more than one in four children.  Medicaid covers millions of senior citizens who rely on life-saving drugs, seniors and disabled people in nursing homes and in home and community-based programs; pregnant women and the births of their babies; relatives who take care of disabled loved ones; people with debilitating mental illness, and a growing number of working people whose employers do not offer health care coverage.