The Truth Hurts

by Peg O'Connell, Health communications consultant and NC SPIN panelist, May 3, 2018.

Sometimes the truth hurts. More precisely, the truth hurts when somebody calls you on what you have been purporting to be the truth.

I imagine that the folks from the ultra-conservative Foundation for Government Accountability are feeling a little tender after Professor Mark Hall of Wake Forest University Law School nailed them on their claims that the states that expanded Medicaid have come to regret it.

In a recent issue brief, Professor Hall reported that states actually don’t regret expanding and in fact they are starting to see the benefits and wisdom of increasing the number of working poor who are eligible for an affordable health insurance solution.  This is important for North Carolinians to know because our legislature is currently discussing what to do about closing the health insurance coverage gap in our state. 

According to Professor Hall, “This Issue Brief reviews that evidence, and evaluates continuing claims by Medicaid opponents that expansion is a ‘proven disaster’ for state budgets. The strong balance of objective evidence indicates that actual costs to states so far from expanding Medicaid are negligible or minor, and that states across the political spectrum do not regret their decisions to expand Medicaid.”

“Claims are not well founded that Medicaid expansion will cost states considerably more than what objective analysts project. Instead, those claims are based on sources that are either incomplete, inaccurate, misleading, or out of date in various ways. Although it is unlikely that Medicaid expansion will turn out to be entirely free to states, based on the considerable experience to date, the probable costs appear to be quite low in comparison with the economic and public health benefits of expansion.”

People of good will can certainly disagree on issues, especially one as important and far-reaching as finding a North Carolina solution for closing the coverage gap, but if we are going to disagree let’s at least rely on facts from credible sources.

To read the full issue brief go to news.law.wfu.edu/files/2018/03/Medicaid-regret-Issue-brief.pdf.