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A Weekly Health Policy Round Up From Health Affairs
August 9, 2020
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FAST TRACK AHEAD OF PRINT
COVID-19
COVID-19 Has Increased Medicaid Enrollment, But Short-Term Enrollment Changes Are Unrelated To Job Losses
By Chris Frenier, Sayeh S. Nikpay, and Ezra Golberstein
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in an unprecedented number of job losses, disrupting health insurance for millions of Americans who had relied on employer-based coverage. Chris Frenier, Sayeh S. Nikpay, and Ezra Golberstein looked for a relationship between increased Medicaid enrollment and unemployment during the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors reviewed available monthly Medicaid
enrollment data for March-May 2020 from twenty-six states to document changes in Medicaid enrollment during this period, as well as how the extent of job loss might be reflected in increased Medicaid enrollment. Read More >>
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RESEARCH ARTICLE: AGE-FRIENDLY HEALTH
Receipt Of Home-Based Medical Care Among Older Beneficiaries Enrolled In Fee-For-Service Medicare
By Jennifer M. Reckrey, Mia Yang, Bruce Kinosian, Evan Bollens-Lund, Bruce Leff, Christine Ritchie, and Katherine Ornstein
More than seven million older Americans are considered homebound, leaving home rarely, if at all, and only with difficulty or assistance. Jennifer Reckrey and coauthors analyze Medicare claims data and find that a very large number of people who could benefit from home-based medical services are not receiving them. This article appears in a new Health Affairs series on Age-Friendly Health supported by the John A. Hartford Foundation. Read More >>
RESEARCH ARTICLE: HEALTH EQUITY
Income Disparities In Access To Critical Care Services
By Genevieve P. Kanter, Andrea G. Segal, and Peter W. Groeneveld
The COVID-19
pandemic has highlighted the importance of intensive care unit (ICU) beds in treating the critical respiratory needs of patients. However, the availability of ICU beds is highly variable across the United States. Genevieve Kanter and coauthors examined disparities in community ICU beds by US communities’ median household income.
Read More >>
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LEADING TO HEALTH: DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH From Rural Germany, Integrated Care Grows Into A Global Model
By Michele Cohen Marill
Fifteen years after a precursor to the accountable care organization (ACO) formed in the Black Forest region, a value-based approach to health care gains traction. Writer Michele Cohen Marill takes readers to rural Germany in this Leading To Health article, which is part of a series on transforming health systems published in Health Affairs with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Read More >>
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HEALTH AFFAIRS REQUEST FOR ABSTRACTS—Border Health and Immigration
Deadline: August 31, 2020
Preparation and formatting guidelines
Submit abstracts via our online submission form
Queries: [email protected]
Health Affairs is planning a theme issue on border health and immigration, to be published in July 2021. We plan to publish approximately 20 peer-reviewed articles including original research, analyses, and commentaries from leading researchers, scholars, analysts, and health care stakeholders. Health Affairs thanks the California Health Care Foundation and the Con Alma Health Foundation for their generous support of this issue.
Please see our request for abstracts for a list of topics of interest, and visit our FAQs page for additional submission requirements.
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THIS WEEK ON THE BLOG
COVID-19
Maximizing Use Of Claims Data To Address COVID-19: We Need To Revisit Gobeille v. Liberty Mutual
By Carmel Shachar, Sara Gerke, and I. Glenn Cohen (8/7/20)
Information from all-payer claims
databases (APCDs) could help states address COVID-19 in a variety of ways, but the Gobeille decision has significantly reduced the amount of data APCDs can collect. Immediate action is needed at the federal level so that states can marshal all available data resources to understand and combat the pandemic. Read More >>
Fighting The COVID-19 Crisis By Protecting American Health Insurance
By James A. Klein and Frederick Isasi (8/7/20)
If Congress fails to protect families’ health insurance, the health and economic crisis caused by the pandemic will spread, as people who lose their insurance stop seeking diagnosis and treatment promptly, families’ economic security is threatened, and the economic viability of first responders and the health care sector worsens. Read More >>
How To Increase Flu Vaccination During The COVID-19 Pandemic
By Jenna Clark (8/6/20)
The same old strategies
that have kept flu vaccination rates stagnant for years won’t be enough. If we want to save lives, we need to move beyond myth busting and education into tackling the real reasons why people don’t get vaccinated. Read More >>
Millions Of Children Have Lost Their Health Insurance—What’s Our Plan?
By Doug Strane, Rebecka Rosenquist, and David Rubin (8/5/20)
The abrupt loss of
employer-sponsored insurance for tens of millions of families creates urgency for policy makers to ensure that children’s coverage does not decline in the coming years. New, bolder approaches will be necessary to prevent a significant erosion of children’s coverage. Read More >>
The Case For A National Universal Masking Mandate
By Vineet Arora, Shikha Jain, Megan Ranney, and Helen Burstin (8/5/20)
Encouraging mask use has not been enough. The time is now for a universal mask mandate. In this post, we discuss what such a mandate could look like and how we could get there.
Read More >>
When Storms Collide: Evictions, COVID-19, And Health Equity
By Craig Evan Pollack, Kathryn M. Leifheit, and Sabriya L. Linton (8/4/20)
A rising tide of COVID-19–related housing evictions is threatening an already fragile national health system, economy, and society at large. Policy solutions exist to prevent evictions and address
their root causes, thereby advancing health and racial equity. Read More >>
3.5 Million Social Needs Requests During COVID-19: What Can We Learn From 2-1-1?
By Matthew W. Kreuter, Rachel Garg, Irum Javed, Balaji Golla, Jennifer Wolff, and Cindy Charles (8/4/20)
During COVID-19, the volume of requests to 2-1-1 helplines has increased dramatically. We have monitored these data throughout the pandemic and are sharing the findings online in more than 65 reports, spanning many dimensions of health, social, and economic impact across the US. Here, we synthesize these findings into four broad observations and discuss their implications. Read More >>
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By Laura Tollen and Elizabeth Keating (8/3/20)
Health care market consolidation—which will likely accelerate post-COVID-19—is often cited as a factor in rising prices and increased growth in overall spending. The Health Affairs Council on Health Care Spending and Value asked what impact market consolidation is likely to have on spending growth, and what could or should be done about it. Read More >>
COVID-19 Job Losses Threaten Insurance Coverage And Access To Reproductive Health Care For Millions
By Adam Sonfield, Jennifer J. Frost, Ruth Dawson, and Laura D. Lindberg (8/3/20)
The current upheaval in employer-sponsored insurance can be expected to have substantial consequences for people seeking sexual and reproductive health. Publicly supported clinics and insurance programs will be asked to serve more people and face new financial and logistical pressures, compounded by years of sustained political attacks by opponents of reproductive rights. Read More >>
FOLLOWING THE ACA
New Guidance Allows Premium Credits For Consumers
By Katie Keith (8/6/20)
On August 4, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued guidance to enable insurers in the individual and small-group markets to temporarily reduce monthly premiums via a premium credit. A premium reduction could significantly help consumers, especially those facing financial instability from the pandemic. Read More >>
California, House File Reply Briefs in Texas
By Katie Keith (8/4/20)
New briefs from the House of Representatives and California in California v. Texas argue that 1) the individual and state plaintiffs lack standing to sue; 2) the individual mandate, with a $0 penalty, remains constitutional; and 3) the mandate, even if unconstitutional, is severable from the rest of the ACA. Read More >>
Fifth Circuit Upholds Certification Rule For Medicaid MCOs
By Katie Keith (8/3/20)
On July 31, 2020, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling that the government owed six states about $479 million for the Affordable Care Act’s health insurance tax as applied to Medicaid managed care entities from 2014 to 2016. Read More >>
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About Health Affairs
Health Affairs is the leading peer-reviewed journal at the intersection of health, health care, and policy. Published monthly by Project HOPE, the journal is available in print and online. Late-breaking content is also found through healthaffairs.org, Health Affairs Today, and Health Affairs Sunday Update.
Project HOPE is a global health and humanitarian relief organization that places power in the hands of local health care workers to save lives across the globe. Project HOPE has published Health Affairs since 1981.
Copyright © Project HOPE: The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.
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