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Open Letter to Senator Grassley on Medicaid Cuts
Open Letter to Senator Grassley on Medicaid Cuts
April 11, 2005
Dear Senator Grassley:
The undersigned organizations are writing to voice our opposition to the Medicaid cuts in both the House and President’s proposed Fiscal Year 2006 budgets. These cuts, which amount to at least $45 billion over ten years, would cause tremendous harm to Iowa. As Congress wrestles with its 2006 budget, we urge you to oppose these cuts, and any caps on federal Medicaid spending.
In Iowa Medicaid provides coverage to over 300,000 people including seniors, children, and people with disabilities. Medicaid funds support public hospitals, community health centers, nursing homes, home and community-based care providers and the physicians and nurses who provide health care to vulnerable Americans. Medicaid fills in the gaps in Medicare coverage for seniors, paying for nearly half of all long-term care services and provides people with disabilities the services and support they need. And it gives children access to critical preventive and primary health care services. Any cuts in this critical program will impair the benefits these vulnerable Iowans receive and diminish the program's ability to meet the growing health care needs of these Iowans.
Health care costs will not disappear just because federal Medicaid funding is reduced. These cuts amount not to a savings, but to a shifting of costs from the federal government to our state. These federal cuts to Medicaid would add almost $390 million over 10 years to our already overburdened state budget. In 2010 alone, Iowa will lose more than $38 million in Medicaid funds, which would be enough to provide coverage to more than 14,000 children or 2,600 seniors that year.
Iowa is already struggling to maintain its share of Medicaid funding. Increasing this burden so dramatically will have dire consequences for the entire state. A cost shift from the federal government will result in either state tax increases and/or cuts in critical state services including health and education. Reducing federal funding in this way would move policy in precisely the wrong direction. States need reliable and consistent federal Medicaid funding to sustain their Medicaid programs.
We are strongly opposed to changes such as a cap in federal funding that would reduce federal support for Medicaid. This program has proven highly successful in responding in difficult economic times because of the program’s guarantee of coverage to people who are eligible as well as its guaranteed financing structure. In the most recent recession, millions of Americans who otherwise would have been without health insurance had coverage thanks to Medicaid.
We ask that you use your position in the conference committee to oppose efforts to cut or cap Medicaid in the FY 2006 budget so that it may continue to meet the vital health care needs of the most vulnerable Americans.
Sincerely,
AFSCME, Iowa Council 61
ASK Resource Center
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Sioux City
Child and Family Policy Center
Family Voices
Food Bank of Iowa
Iowa Association for Home Care
Iowa Citizen Action Network
Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement
Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence
Iowa Coalition for Housing and the Homeless
Iowa Conference of the United Methodist Church
Iowa Farmers Union
Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO
Iowa Governor's Developmental Disabilities Council
Iowa for Health Care
National Association of Social Workers, Iowa Chapter
National Catholic Rural Life Conference
National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Iowa Chapter
South Central Iowa Federation of Labor
Visiting Nurse Services
Matt Russell serves as a contact for this sign on letter from the above Iowa organizations
Matt Russell, Organizer
Iowa Citizen Action Network
3520 Beaver Ave., Suite D
Des Moines, IA 50310
515-277-5077 ext. 15
MRussell@IowaCAN.org
www.iowacan.org
Privitizing Medicare: The cost to Iowa
The Cost to Iowa
Guidling Principles of Health Care Reform
Iowa Human Needs Advocates is a working group of over 30 organizations that advocate in the human services arena. ICAN and IHNA have drafted guiding principles for health care reform in Iowa.
EVENT
RESOURCES
People or Profits: The Game Show
Iowa Human Needs Advocates is a working group of over 30 organizations that advocate in the human services arena. ICAN and IHNA have drafted guiding principles for health care reform in Iowa.
Learn more and take action here, a web site for consumers who want to join the fight for fair prescription drugs prices.
STATEMENT
ICAN organizer Matt Russell addresses committee members regarding the need for prescription drug price relief in Iowa. Read his statement here.
REPORTS
The Excess Cost of the Bush Prescription Drug Plan in Iowa
Learn about how Medicare Part D wastes Iowa taxpayer money and how we can fix this disasterous plan.
Health Care in Iowa: A Continuing Problem of Access
Iowa Policy Project has released this new report on health care access. One in 11 Iowans falls through the cracks of health-care coverage in Iowa, lacking access to health insurance through an employer or through government services – and despite some recent gains, the percentage of Iowans who are uninsured has not improved from the start of the decade.
Medicaid at 40: A Service That Works, For Americans Who Need It
IOWANS FACE RISING DRUG COST BURDEN: Iowa among the states most affected by rising prescription drug costs. Read entire report here.
MEDICARE CAMPAIGN
How will the Bush Medicare Prescription Drug Law affect your budget in 2006? Click here for a month-by-month cost analysis.
To see Important Facts You Need to Know About the Bush Medicare Prescription Law of 2003, click here.
For a fact sheet about The Medicare Prescription Discount Drug Card, click here.
To see how the discount card costs compares unfavorably to VA, Canada, and drugstore.com, click here.
Medicare Worksheet - to estimate what you will have to pay in 2006 for prescription drugs, download and print this worksheet.
NEWS FROM THE ROAD
Medicare Road Show Picks Up Steam in the Midwest, April 13, 2004: Des Moines, Iowa.
PRESCRIPTION DRUG BENEFIT Q & A
The new Medicare law is extremely complicated and extremely politicized. Click here for a question and answer resource from FamiliesUSA that can help you better understand the effects of this law.
HEALTH CARE PRINCIPLES
These principles are the cornerstone of a quality health care system. Any health care proposal must bring us closer to meeting them.
JOINT STATEMENTS
A coalition of groups demands that Senator Grassley protect Medicaid funding. Read the letter here.
Joint statement on the effects of the Prescription Drug and Medicare Improvement Act of 2003
REPORT
Congress’ Prescription Deal Costs Iowans More and Undermines the Entire Medicare System. Released 11/18/03 by ICAN and the Institute for America's Future. Click here.
FACT SHEETS
The Medicare Part D Disaster: Extend the May 15 Deadline
State Rx for 2005: House File 152
Our Fight for Fair Prescription Drug Prices
Capping Medicaid Funding: How Block Grants Would Hurt States -- Families USA, December 2004
Comparing the Medicare prescription drug proposals: Senate, House, and Conference
Iowa State Prescription Fact Sheet
IN THE NEWS
3/25/06, Des Moines Register: Drug-benefit cost: A whopper
3/22/06, Radio Iowa: Group seeks changes in Medicare prescription drug benefit
09/27/05, Quad City Times: Putting a face on budget plight
09/20/05, Des Moines Register: Hearings planned on cuts to social programs
08/13/05, Quad City Times: Letter to the editor -- Health care coverage still a major concern
08/10/05, Des Moines Register: Editorial -- Everyone deserves health-care coverage
08/04/05, Newsradio 1040 WHO: Medicaid Turns 40
07/16/05, Vilsack touts Medicaid effort as national model to fellow governors
PRESS RELEASES
04/20/06 - Extend the May 15 Deadline to Sign Up for Prescription Drug Benefit