Effort to get dental coverage for pregnant women on AHCCCS fails again
"Everyone had to put aside key priorities to be able to fund the teacher pay raise,"
Yee's bill would have given pregnant women enrolled in
The bill's failure was a "missed opportunity" to improve public health, said
"We think it will reduce the number of premature births and a subportion of higher-expense babies who may be in the hospital for more days," Humble said.
Advocates say the measure could improve birth outcomes, as gum disease can be passed from pregnant moms to their babies.
Humble said giving oral health care to women during pregnancy is a "teachable moment" for counseling women on cavity prevention for themselves and for their babies. Cavities are the most common chronic disease affecting children in
Physical and nutritional changes that occur during pregnancy raise the risk of dental and gum problems. About one-third of pregnant women in the state have gum disease, the
The March of Dimes in
"The scientific jury is still out on whether the link is causal or just correlative," said
"But there is a considerable amount of literature on the link that suggests the inflammatory mediators produced in response to periodontal disease affect placental function, which can lead to induction of labor and poor fetal outcomes."
Bipartisan support
Pregnant women with an annual income of up to 156 percent of the federal poverty level (nearly
Yee is leaving the
"There were so many co-sponsors, so it wasn't a lack of support," Yee said. "It was a timing issue."
While the legislature's focus on K-12 education was a key reason the dental bill did not move forward, disparate estimates of how much the measure would cost were another.
Yee's original bill placed the state's direct cost at an estimated
That JLBC analysis assumes the benefit could result in more pregnant women on AHCCCS seeking prenatal care and drive up costs, since the "pregnant" category of AHCCCS has a less favorable formula for federal matching funds than the regular population.
It's always good public health policy for women to get prenatal care and prevent expensive conditions like preeclampsia, gestational diabetes and other issues that can be addressed during pregnancy but could result in costly medical care if they are not, Humble said.
"You have to believe that the secondary cost of preventive care is less than whatever it costs on the emergency side," he said.
Long-term investment
It took seven years to get an emergency benefit for adults on AHCCCS restored after it was slashed in 2010, said
Earle is optimistic the dental benefit for pregnant Medicaid enrollees will eventually pass, too.
"I think the problem was that this, along with other budgetary items, got caught in the Red for Ed tide," Earle said. "We thought we had pretty good prospects until a lot of that started up."
But Earle said supporters, who include the
"Potentially there are some budgetary impacts in the short-term, but clearly the long-term impacts of healthier pregnancies and healthier babies far outweighs the minimal investment in dental care."
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