By Alexandria Douglas-Bartolone, Guest Columnist
State Sen. Kevin Corbin (R-Franklin) announced that Senate Republicans have developed a healthcare bill that, if passed, will expand health-care coverage to over 500,000 uninsured North Carolinians.
The Senate’s bill is designed to provide a unique, North Carolina solution to help North Carolina residents who fall into the “coverage gap” because they earn too much to qualify for Medicaid, but not enough to be able to afford quality health insurance.
We need to applaud the Senate’s efforts, and encourage our elected officials in the House and Senate to support the bill.
- According to the 2020 U.S. Census, North Carolina has the ninth-highest rate of uninsured residents in the country: over 1.15 million uninsured as of 2019 (11 percent of the state’s total population), and that was before COVID-19 wiped out hundreds of thousands of jobs that came with health-care benefits. In Cherokee County, 16.2 percent of our neighbors were uninsured.
- Most of North Carolina’s uninsured are employed – but many work for employers who are not required to provide health insurance benefits. This includes people who work for small businesses (under 50 employees); people who are self-employed, or entrepreneurs who are creating their own businesses; and people who work in part-time jobs, temporary jobs or in seasonal employment.
- The Senate’s Medicaid Expansion bill will bring over $2 billion in federal funds to cover 90 percent of the cost of expanding health-care coverage to our state’s uninsured; and the bill includes practical solutions to cover the remaining 10 percent of the program’s costs. This will go a long way to helping rural “safety net” hospitals, like Erlanger Western Carolina, that provide medical care to uninsured patients who cannot pay their medical bills.
- Two years ago the N.C. Business Council endorsed Medicaid expansion on the grounds that it is good for business and the overall economy of North Carolina. It will bring increased federal revenue, lower health-care costs, increase employment in the health care sector and increase revenues for local government.
Most important is that passage of the Senate’s Medicaid expansion bill will increase access to health-care coverage and eliminate the financial hardships faced by hundreds of thousands of uninsured North Carolinians. It will remove the financial barriers to preventive care that make so many people delay getting recommended screenings, such as prostate exams or mammograms.
It is frightening to think about the reality that many of our neighbors could be wiped out financially if someone in their family was suddenly faced with a medical emergency.
Please join me in thanking Corbin for his leadership on this issue, and reach out to our elected representatives to thank them for supporting Medicaid expansion in North Carolina.
The writer is a resident of Marble.