Report: 1.1 million Pennsylvanians could lose health insurance with ACA repeal

Jan. 20--Nearly 3,500 Pennsylvanians could die prematurely each year without Medicaid expansion.

That's according to the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, which released a 25-page report Thursday about potential implications for Pennsylvanians if the Affordable Care Act is repealed.

Around 1.1 million people could lose their health insurance, including most of the 685,000 state residents who became newly qualified for Medicaid expansion in 2015, said Marc Stier, director of the center.

"Our estimate is that the loss of so many people to health insurance means that about 3,425 premature deaths will occur every year that could have been prevented if all these people were insured," he said. "And the research that supports these figures basically compares the states that expanded Medicaid to the states that didn't expand Medicaid. And that data shows that mortality rates declined pretty substantially in the states that expanded Medicaid, and not in the states that did not."

According to the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services, 34,904 individuals were newly eligible for Medicaid within the congressional district of U.S. Rep. Keith Rothfus, R-12, Sewickley.

Some aspects of the law, which set up the health care exchanges and added the clause to not discriminate against clients on the basis of pre-existing conditions, cannot be immediately repealed by Congress using a budget reconciliation process because they do not have immediate federal budgetary implications.

The most immediate repeals deal with rolling back Medicaid expansion and eliminating tax credits.

Those tax credits make plans affordable for individuals, and without them, Stier predicts people will opt out of getting marketplace coverage because it will be cost prohibitive.

"We believe almost everyone who gets insurance through the marketplace and receives a tax credit will have to give up their insurance because they won't be able to afford it," he said. "... the guaranteed issue provision that says you can get insurance whether you have a pre-existing condition or not will still be in place. The mandate, the tax penalty if you don't get insurance, will not be in place.

"There's going to be an incentive for people not to get insurance unless they actually become sick. And that's particularly true for young people and healthy people."

Repealing the Affordable Care Act could affect not only those who are insured through Medicaid expansion or marketplace coverage, but it could also be a major blow to Pennsylvania jobs, state budget and overall economy.

About 137,000 jobs in Pennsylvania could be affected by 2019, including more than 50,000 health care jobs.

Stier estimates thousands of jobs lost in construction and real estate and retail trade too.

"People in the hospital and health care industry and all the people who supply goods and services to the health care industry now have wages and profits, which they use to spend on other things, Stier said. "That's why the construction/real estate sector does well. People can purchase houses if they're employed and if they're making more money. The retail trade industry, that's the result of people having money to purchase other things on main streets and the malls."

Read the full report here: http://bit.ly/2k8aBeG

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