Fitch rates Senate GOP's healthcare bill: 3 takeaways

Kelly Gooch -

Fitch Ratings revealed its projected outlook on how Medicaid provisions and other parts of the Senate GOP's Better Care Reconciliation Act draft could affect states.

Here are three takeaways from the agency's report.

1. The BCRA could result in states seeing significantly less funding from the federal government for Medicaid, according to Fitch.

"States that expanded Medicaid access to the newly eligible population under the ACA are particularly at risk. But, even non-expansion states will face budgetary challenges, which will likely accelerate for all states over time," the agency said.

2. Fitch believes the BCRA's proposed Medicaid spending growth cap "opens the program up to further reductions through legislative tightening of the growth factor." The BCRA, revealed Thursday, includes a per-capita cap program that would replace the existing Medicaid funding structure and gives states the option to apply for Medicaid block grants. Fitch notes the Senate GOP bill also moves the Medicaid spending growth cap from medical inflation to the consumer price index for urban consumers (CPI-U) in 2025, which Fitch calls "a broader and slower-growing measure."

3. Fitch said it expects the per-capita cap solely will contribute $370 billion in reduced Medicaid funding to states, based on a December 2016 Congressional Budget Office analysis of a similar per-capita cap proposal, as well as the CBO's score of the House GOP's American Health Care Act.

Read the full Fitch report here.

 

More articles on healthcare finance:

Georgia hospital lands last-minute buyer, avoids closure
California medical group files for bankruptcy
Illinois hospital seeks $10M property tax refund

 

Copyright © 2024 Becker's Healthcare. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy. Cookie Policy. Linking and Reprinting Policy.