by Dave Williams | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA – Cuts to Medicaid contained in President Donald Trump’s new budget bill put 37 Georgia nursing homes at risk of closing, according to a study released by Brown University’s School of Public Health.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported that the legislation, which the Republican-controlled Congress passed this month, will slash Medicaid by $1 trillion during the next 10 years.
The bill passed without a single Democratic vote in either the U.S. House of Representatives or Senate.
Seventy percent of Georgians living in nursing homes rely on Medicaid, Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., said Wednesday.
“This is a serious threat to the health and wellbeing of Georgia seniors,” he said. “Georgia nursing homes are already struggling. … This law is going to deepen those challenges.”
The study, requested by Senate Democrats, identified 579 nursing homes across the nation at risk of closing. It based those findings on nursing homes with 85% or more of their patients on Medicaid, those with occupancy rates of less than 80%, and those receiving poor-quality ratings from the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Nursing homes in 30 Georgia counties appeared on the list. Seven counties have two nursing homes listed as at risk: Baldwin, Bibb, Fulton, Hancock, Muscogee, Tattnall, and Wilcox.
The federal reductions will force states to pick up the slack, the study concluded.
“Significant cuts in Medicaid will force states to make decisions about which ‘optional’ Medicaid services they will continue to fund and how stringent Medicaid eligibility standards are to be set,” according to the report. “Nursing home care is a mandatory benefit under Medicaid; therefore, all states would be required to continue offering it.”
Congressional Democrats and a smattering of Republicans have called for revisiting the budget bill later this year to reverse some of the more damaging cuts.
“(Republicans) need to work with us to save nursing homes and hospitals across the country … to undo the damage that’s already been done,” Ossoff said.
