Reduction of the Medicaid Financing of Mehmet OZ proposed

Dr. Mehmet OZ, the head of the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), has proposed that he supports a reduction in federal financing for those who use Medicaid as part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Newsweek has contacted the press office of the CMS via e -mail to get a comment.

Why is it important

The remarks from OZ indicate that the ACA could be influenced by the impending cuts of the budget that enabled the states to extend the coverage of Medicaid to adults that earn up to 138 percent of the federal military level level.

From mid -2024, more than 20 million people received reporting through this expansion. This emerges from figures from the impartial organization for health policy KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation).

The Republicans of the House Energy and Commerce Committee had the task of finding savings of $ 880 billion. Medicaid is a main goal without alternatives, and Republican and democratic legislators have warned of the effects on voters if the financing of the service is reduced.

What to know?

OZ spoke on Monday at the Global Conference of the Milken Institute in Los Angeles and suggested that the Federal Government have checked the care of relatively healthy people who have received access to Medicaid through expansion provisions, compared to the traditional Medicaid population, which include children with low income, seniors and people with disabilities.

“Since we pay 90 percent of the money for the capable person and only 65 percent for a traditionally poor, young, old or disabled person of Medicaid, who actually moves money for the powerful population,” said Oz, according to Bloomberg.

In an interview with Fox News at the conference, he said: “The governors are really desperately about the costs of Medicaid. It strips their ability to provide resources for education, other social services to take care of their people, and we become a massive health care with a bound state, a bound country, and we don’t want that.”

He also commented on the spread of waste in the system and said: “We have billions and billions of dollars a year, the Medicaid insurance for people who lived in a state and then moved to another state.”

He said that the federal government in both states pays a person’s reporting for the federal government, and adds that not only funds but also the services are wasted.

Ten states have decided not to expand Medicaid as part of the ACA, which cited cost concerns and ideological opposition.

In states that have expanded, the prospect of reduced federal support increases the risk of cover losses, especially for those who rely on Medicaid for routine medical care and preventive services.

Some states have laws that would automatically terminate Medicaid’s expansion if federal financing is below a certain threshold. In such cases, the effects could be quick and widespread, which may leave millions of non -insured and exhausting health systems.

What people say

Dr. Benjamin Sommers, professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School, Boston, told Newsweek: “The ACA financed the Medicaid expansion generously because the legislature knew that states would not be able to increase state expenditure that would be necessary for the original Medicaid rates for covering the new compensation. The federal rate is higher for expansion population. Have undergone Medicaid aid measures.

He said that the reduction in the expansion matric rate “that 15 million people would lose medicaid, and more than 10 million of them would not be insured if this directive was issued” based on the research of the Urban Institute. “In order to be clear, these cuts would not” protect “medicaid for endangered beneficiaries or in any way redirect money from the expansion to other groups.

Jamila Michener, professor of government and public order at Cornell University, New York, told Newsweek: “Dr. Oz ‘logic on the different coverage of the Federal Government on various Medicaid population groups is strongly faulty. The views that he expresses reflect inappropriate knowledge of the medicaid program and its overall spaces.

“Firstly, the ACA expansion population is a much cheaper group that the government has cost less because it is the efficient and humane choice because it gives people access to health care at a relatively low price. Secondly, the resources that we spend on the expansion of Medicaid expansions turn to everyone while dealing with the excuses. from not evidence and reduces the ACA expansion agreement (90 percent) to considerable declines when entering Medicaid.

“The Medicaid program contains very little fraud, and the fraud that exists is mainly among the health service providers and others who want to benefit from health care, and not in people who rely on Medicaid insurance for their survival and well-being.”

Michael Sparer, Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University, New York, told Newsweek: “The reduction of the federal share of the expanded Medicaid cover would probably lead to some states to drop the expansion. Other states would have to decide whether they would absorb the additional costs or reduce the authorization, advantages or reimbursement of the program in order to compensate for the difference. The result would probably be less medicaid.

“There is relatively little ‘fraud’ in the Medicaid program, and this fraud is mainly carried out by providers and not by beneficiaries. The discussion about” waste “is much more complicated, as this depends on how to define such waste.”

What happens next

Every step towards reducing federal financing for the expansion of Medicaid would probably require congress measures and will be exposed to legal and political obstacles. The comments from OZ indicate that there is a broader administrative interest in the redesign of the merger of Medicaid dollars.

Update 5/6/25, 11:59 a.m. ET: This article was updated with a comment by Michael Sparer.