Ga. Working Through Medicaid Application Backlog After Federal Scrutiny
In the meantime, some in Alabama say no Medicaid expansion there is hurting economic development in rural parts of the state.
Georgia Health News: State Says It’s Hard At Work On Medicaid Backlog
A state health agency says it’s working though the application backlog for Medicaid that recently provoked federal scrutiny. The Department of Community Health has made decisions on eligibility for up to 70 percent of the 88,854 “account transfers” from Georgia’s insurance exchange, the agency said Friday. The backlog in Georgia is linked to the thousands of people expected to join Medicaid and PeachCare this year as a result of the Affordable Care Act (Miller, 7/25).
AL.com: Lack Of Medicaid Expansion Hampers Economic Development In Rural Alabama, Official Said
Alabama's unwillingness to expand Medicaid is adding to the economic distress of the state's rural communities and further impeding their economic development efforts, officials said today. Danne Howard, senior vice president of government relations and emergency preparedness for the Alabama Hospital Association, was the lead speaker of a rural economic development session to kick off the Economic Development Association of Alabama's summer 2014 conference. She said a dozen rural hospitals have closed across the state and more than a dozen more could be lost over the next two years (Tomberlin, 7/27).