Medical Groups Pan Senate Bill-AMA, AAoP, American Health Inst.
The American Medical Association said it is still reviewing the bill but has “grave concerns” with its cuts to Medicaid spending.
AMA ✔ @AmerMedicalAssn
“Does it improve coverage? No. Does it improve affordability? No.” — AMA president. spr.ly @MorningEdition #HealthcareBillThe American Academy of Pediatrics said it “fails to meet children’s needs.” The American Academy Of Family Physicians said it reflects many of the same “flawed concepts” in the House bill and in many ways, poses “a graver threat to millions of Americans, particularly children, people with disabilities and older Americans.” The American Hospital Association said the Senate should “go back to the drawing board.”
State Medicaid directors plan to issue a statement today saying the bill’s slower Medicaid growth formula is “insufficient and unworkable.”
“No amount of administrative or regulatory flexibility can compensate for the federal spending reductions that would occur as a result of this bill,” the National Association of Medicaid Directors will say, according to a statement provided to The Health 202.
Not even the bill’s more generous premium subsidies (relative to the House bill), its two-year retention of extra Obamacare cost-sharing subsidies or its repeal of nearly all the ACA taxes won over the insurance industry. “We are not taking a support or oppose position,” Kristine Grow, spokeswoman for America’s Health Insurance Plans, told the Hill.