More than 200,000 Colorado kids could lose Medicaid coverage starting next year, though many remain eligible for government help
State officials are urging families who rely on government health insurance plans to make sure their addresses are up to date and complete their renewal package
Colorado Sun
Valerie Mosley, Special to The Colorado Sun
Hundreds of thousands of Coloradans who rely on government-subsidized health insurance programs could lose coverage beginning next year, many of them children whose families otherwise can’t afford the checkups, vaccines and preventive care kids need in their earliest years.
It’s a problem bearing down on families across the country with the federal public health emergency set to expire Jan. 11. The federal declaration, issued at the start of the coronavirus pandemic more than two years ago, barred states from releasing anyone from Medicaid rolls during the health crisis. Unless the federal government extends the emergency order — it previously extended the order to mid-October — about 700,000 Coloradans could lose access to Medicaid and Child Health Plan Plus, a public health insurance option for people whose income is too high to qualify them for Medicaid.
About 220,000 of those people are kids, according to data provided by the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy & Financing.
The department estimates that about 55% of the 700,000 people at risk of being cut from a government health insurance plan will actually lose their coverage. Many of those children and families could be dropped from health insurance coverage despite still being eligible for government assistance.
Read the full story via the Colorado Sun.
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