U.S. Sen. Casey: CHIP program needs to be reauthorized now

Dec. 18--PITTSBURGH -- Health insurance for approximately 180,000 children in Pennsylvania and 9 million children across the country hang in the balance as families await for federal reauthorization of the Children's Health Insurance Program, commonly known as CHIP.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey spoke at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC on Monday urging Republican lawmakers to reauthorize the program early this week rather than have families worrying about insurance coverage over the holidays. Instead, Casey said, the tax bill has taken precedent.

"If they're going to hold up the Children's Health Insurance Program because they're trying to get their tax bill done first, or they're trying to use leverage on the other legislation, spending bills or whatever else has to get done, that's just unacceptable," said Casey, D-Scranton.

Casey's father, former Gov. Robert P. Casey, signed the Pennsylvania Children's Health Insurance Program into state law in 1992. Five years later, a federal version of CHIP, modeled from Pennsylvania's program, was passed.

Casey said approximately 180,000 children are currently enrolled in the program in Pennsylvania. Over the past year, 340,000 children in the state have been on the insurance plan. Families that make too much income to be eligible for Medicaid but cannot afford health insurance are typically eligible for CHIP.

Connie Cavara, a nurse and mother of three from Pittsburgh, said CHIP has been invaluable for her family. Two of her children have health insurance through the program.

"I'm fortunate enough to have a good job and good health care that's employer sponsored; however, that's just for me," Cavara said. "If I wanted to add my children, that would be, after taxes, almost my entire paycheck. And that's just out of reach for me."

She added, "I don't know why we're debating this. We're talking about the most vulnerable population, the children, who can't go out and get a job with employer-sponsored health care."

Last week, Gov. Tom Wolf signed a reauthorization of Pennsylvania's CHIP funding. However, the state provides only 10 percent of the $450 million CHIP budget, while 90 percent of the program is funded through federal dollars.

"We're adding one more burden onto the parent that they have to fight for insurance," said Diane Hupp, chief of nursing at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. "It's enough that a parent walks through these doors, whether it's through the emergency room, whether it's for an elective procedure. It's probably one of the scariest times of a child's and family's life, coming here to Children's Hospital."

Program funding is there, Casey said. It's only a matter of getting it passed. He said the program should have been reauthorized months ago, but Republican lawmakers were focused on repealing the Affordable Care Act.

"The original deadline was Sept. 30. This is already late," Casey said. "But I can't understand why while they're obsessing about getting a tax bill for big corporations and the super rich, they're delaying action on children's health insurance. I think we should have a vote on this on the Senate floor in a singular, individual way."

There have been discussions of attaching the program to other legislation to get it passed through, which Casey described as "a cynical approach" to support a bipartisan, children's health-care program.

Families who have children enrolled in CHIP will begin to receive notices in the mail next month if the reauthorization isn't passed.

"Why should anyone have to spend even five minutes of the holiday worrying about whether or not their child, who's been enrolled in the Children's Health Insurance Program, is still enrolled?" Casey said. "When we have the funding, we have the authority to do it, it's been through the finance committees. So I would just urge people to call Washington and say, get the KIDS Act done."

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