Nixon lays out health care plan

Gov. Jay Nixon is traveling the state today to announce his plan to provide health care coverage for an additional estimated 300,000 Missouri citizens by expanding Medicaid coverage.

Speaking from Truman Medical Center in Kansas City this morning, Nixon said federal funding would cover 100 percent of the costs for the first three years and 90 percent or more in subsequent years.

"My consistent position on expanding Medicaid has been to carefully study the options and then determine what is the best fit for Missouri," Nixon said in a news release. "That is why the budget I plan to submit to the legislature for fiscal year 2014 will include federal funding to provide health care for an estimated additional 300,000 Missourians - men, women and children - who currently have no health insurance. It's the smart thing to do, and it's the right thing to do."

Nixon is scheduled to make similar announcements today at the Barnes-Jewish Center for Outpatient Health in St. Louis and at 3 p.m. at Springfield's Jordan Valley Community Health Care Center, 440 E. Tampa St.

According to the release, the Affordable Care Act allows for Medicaid expansion to cover low-income Americans who can't afford health care insurance by raising the eligibility level to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. A family of four living at that level in 2012 makes $31,809 per year.

Nixon said federal funding would cover 100 percent of the costs for calendar years 2014-16, and the state would pay 5 percent of the cost in 2017, 6 percent in 2018, 7 percent in 2019 and 10 percent beginning in 2020.

"This will improve the health and the quality of life for hundreds of thousands of Missourians, and transform the expensive, scattershot way we now provide care for people with no health insurance," Nixon said in the release.

The current system reimburses hospitals for treatment of people with no health insurance, but under the Affordable Care Act, payments to hospitals will be reduced, according to the release, which noted hospitals would have to bear the additional costs without federal aid.[[In-content Ad]]