Florida hospital executives are sounding the alarm that, if the state does not expand Medicaid coverage under Obamacare, hospitals will lose federal funding they have relied on to care for uninsured patients. Florida hospitals spent more than $2.8 billion caring for uninsured patients in 2011, hospital officials said Monday.
The Affordable Care Act will end some major federal funding streams to hospitals that cover large numbers of uninsured patients because the law assumes those patients will have insurance through Medicaid expansion or through state online health exchanges. But the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Medicaid expansion is optional for states, leaving Florida hospitals concerned they will be on the hook for huge bills with less money to pay for them than in the past.
Florida Agency for Health Care Administration recently slashed the projected cost of Medicaid expansion to as low as $3 billion over 10 years, a huge drop from the nearly $26 billion touted by Gov. Rick Scott, who repeatedly this figure to express concerns over the state moving forward with an expansion of Medicaid eligibility.
