This item from McClatchy hit newspapers all across the country yesterday, including the front page in my hometown of South Bend, Ind. It’s being reported more than a month too late:
States could lose some Medicaid funds in health overhaul
…The new health care law could shift billions of dollars from cash-strapped states to the federal government by changing the way Medicaid prescription-drug rebates are treated, according to state and industry officials and an examination of Medicaid spending data.
Democrats included a provision in the law that’s intended to raise $38 billion over 10 years by requiring drugmakers to offer bigger discounts to Medicaid, the joint federal-state health insurance program for the poor. The rebates will continue to be divided between the states and the federal government, but under the new law, Washington will get a bigger share beginning this year.
…All but three states — Arizona, Massachusetts and New Mexico — stand to lose money because of the change, in many cases millions of dollars a year, according to a state-by-state examination of 2009 Medicaid spending records by Kaiser Health News.
To be unaware that states would be hurting under Obamacare, you had to ignore months of Republican and even Democratic governors’ warnings. Speaker Pelosi’s statement continues to come true, that she had to pass the bill so that we could find out what’s in it.
