STATE CAPITOL NEWSLETTER: Insurance snapshot
An estimated 1.1 million Wisconsin citizens now get their health needs met through Medicaid, the statefederal program for the poor.
The last figure for 2009 enrollment was 1.084 million, and enrollment growth has averaged 9.7 percent annually for the last 10 years. More than $6 billion is now spent on the program annually. The federal government pays about 58 percent of the Medicaid costs in Wisconsin; the latest figure puts the state cost at $2.1 billion annually.
Half of participants are children, a fourth are parents or pregnant women, and the other quarter are the elderly and disabled. The elderly and disabled account for 66 percent of the spending, according to the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance.
Medicaid was started in 1965 as a companion to Medicare, which provides health coverage for the elderly. Medicaid kicks in for the elderly when assets near exhaustion. That often is a reflection of nursinghome costs.
Medicaid had two surges in enrollments. The first came in the 1990s when welfare reform replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children (ADFC). The goal was to encourage ex-welfare recipients to work. A second period of growth occurred in the last decade when Medicaid was expanded to make sure all children had health care coverage.
Medicaid costs are at the forefront of issues that will confront the new governor elected in November. Medicaid programs have helped Wisconsin have the second-highest percentage of citizens with health coverage. Only Massachusetts has a higher percentage of covered population, experts suggest.
Perhaps the high percentage of citizens with coverage is why the health care reform fight doesn’t seem as important in Wisconsin.
The 1.1 million persons covered means over half of Wisconsin citizens get their health needs met through taxpayer-financed programs. There are more than 800,000 citizens over the age of 65 who are eligible for Medicare. Other programs are veterans and military health care and health insurance programs for those working for state, municipal, and federal governments.
Some might like to borrow a phrase from the congressional debates and label the programs as “federal options.” Of course, you have to be poor, old, or working for a government to get into the biggest of those programs.
Others will suggest that these Wisconsin numbers amount to socialism run amuck. Some on the far right may suggest it amounts to communism.
Health experts said neither Medicare nor Medicaid covers the true costs of care. That’s made up by charging higher premiums for health insurance. Put bluntly, those with private health insurance (which includes the government workers) are subsidizing Medicare and Medicaid.
Medicaid costs will challenge whoever is elected this November. Medical costs are unlikely to decline. Some in government may want to squeeze down Medicaid coverage. In turn, that will present a challenge to those who advocate for the poor and children.
