Doctors and activists met in Sterling Heights Wednesday to organize to fight federal budget cuts to Medicaid that many experts say will be necessary for the Trump administration to reach its spending-reduction goals.
The health care program is among many facing deep budget cuts as the administration pushes for big reductions in federal spending.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report Wednesday estimating that millions of Americans would lose Medicaid coverage under the various proposals being circulated by Republicans as cost-saving measures.
House Republicans are scrounging to come up with as much as $1.5 trillion in cuts across federal health care, food stamp, and other programs, to offset the revenue lost for some $4.5 trillion in tax breaks that skew toward wealthy taxpayers.
“Under each of those options, Medicaid enrollment would decrease and the number of people without health insurance would increase,” the CBO report said.
Julie Rowe is the state director with the group For Our Future-Michigan. Rowe said Michigan’s Republican congressmembers can learn a lot from the CBO report.
“I hope that they read the report and understand that these are real people,” said Rowe, “Not just people who voted for them. People that live lives, who have families, who go to work every day, and who need healthcare.”
There are those who see the CBO report differently.
The conservative Cato Institute says the CBO’s projections reveal that Medicaid is a highly inefficient way of covering the uninsured.
Any reductions of federal spending on Medicaid will likely have an effect on the 2.5 million Michiganders who rely on the program for their health care coverage.
State Senator Kevin Hertel (D-St. Clair Shores), chair of the Michigan Senate Health Policy Committee, said Michigan lawmakers would have to face difficult decisions if there are deep cuts to federal Medicaid spending.
“Medicaid is a state program, but it’s majority funded by the federal government,” said Hertel.
A congressional committee postponed consideration of potential Medicaid spending cuts Wednesday.
