INELIGIBLE RECIPIENTS? - U.S. Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana has asked the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to investigate Louisiana’s Medicaid program after he severely criticized the state’s health agency and its leader, Dr. Rebekah Gee earlier this week.
According to the Monroe News Star, the Republican Senator wrote a letter to the federal Medicaid Administrator requesting the agency to “investigate whether or not the Louisiana Department of Health has violated federal Medicaid regulations.” His action was prompted after the state’s department of health revealed as many as 37,000 Louisiana Medicaid recipients may be ineligible because their income exceeds the limit for coverage. According
to Kennedy -- the cost of the insurance for those who might be ineligible could be as high as $200 million, Last month, Louisiana’s Health Department sent letters to those 37,000 Medicaid recipients notifying them they have one month to prove their eligibility to continue receiving the insurance coverage.
Most of the 37,000 people in question are part of the Medicaid expansion Gov John Bel Edwards ushered in as one of his first orders of business in 2016. The expansion insured about 500,000 more Louisianians and slashed the state’s uninsured rate in half.
