The U.S. House’s Agriculture Committee passed a farm bill this week that would cut more than $20 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly the Food Stamp Program) and other nutrition services. The cuts pose a threat to thousands of Georgia families struggling to put food on… [Read more]

Opponents of Medicaid expansion are misrepresenting the findings of a new study to argue that Georgia and other states shouldn’t extend this vital health coverage to more people without health insurance.
Contrary to what some in the anti-expansion camp argue, the study – which updates findings from an earlier… [Read more]

The General Assembly renewed the state’s hospital provider fee to fund Medicaid in the early weeks of the 2013 session.The fee was set to expire this June. By renewing the fee four more years, Georgia’s lawmakers continue a vitally import source of revenue. The fee raises money that will… [Read more]

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie announced today he will expand Medicaid coverage in his state, becoming the eighth Republican governor to change course and embrace the expansion.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott announced last week his state will expand Medicaid coverage, joining Christie and New Mexico Gov. Susanna Martinez as… [Read more]

The Saporta Report features Georgia Budget and Policy Institute’s Director of Health Policy Timothy Sweeney’s op-ed on Medicaid expansion.
As published in the Saporta Report.
A rule of thumb holds that when something happens three times in short order, it’s a trend. So it’s fair to say that… [Read more]

This week, two more Republican governors came out in support for taking advantage of new federal funding to ensure health coverage for more of their state’s residents. Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder bring to six the number of GOP governors who have announced they will… [Read more]

Categories: Author, Blog, Health Care, Timothy Sweeney | Comments (1)

In this week’s State of the State address, Gov. Nathan Deal reiterated his opposition to using Medicaid to expand access to health coverage in Georgia, even as several other Republican governors recently expressed intentions to take advantage of the substantial new federal resources for their health care systems. To be… [Read more]

Gov. Nathan Deal announced today, in no uncertain terms, that he intends to leave half-a-million Georgians without health insurance, even though the state has an affordable way to get them coverage. By strongly reiterating his opposition to expanding Medicaid, he practically guaranteed that Georgia will remain stuck with a substandard… [Read more]

The Georgia Budget and Policy Institute today joined doctors, hospitals, patients and other nonprofits to announce Cover Georgia, a new coalition of more than 40 organizations working together to urge state officials to bring health coverage to hundreds of thousands of Georgians and boost Georgia’s economy by expanding… [Read more]

Fully implementing health care reform in Georgia would extend insurance coverage to more than 1 million Georgians — including 700,000 by just expanding Medicaid. The cost to the state? A mere 1 percent bump in overall spending over 10 years.
Those figures, from a new Urban Institute study, are a… [Read more]