“State Faces $6.1 Billion Deficit Amid Medicaid Woes,” by Nick Reisman, Spectrum News

“Added expenses for the state’s health care program for the poor has contributed to a $6.1 billion budget gap, according to a mid-year update released on Friday by Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s budget office. The report, released weeks after legally mandated deadline was blown, points to increases in the minimum wage, a phase out of added funding by the federal government and an increase in enrollment and costs for managed long-term care and payments to cash-distressed hospitals.”

 

LTC Comment (from Stephen A. Moses, President, Center for Long-Term Care Reform):

The idea that New York Medicaid is a “program for the poor” is preposterous. Virtually everyone, regardless of income or assets, qualifies for Medicaid LTC in New York including in the past 24-hour-a-day home care. New York made famous the process of “Medicaiding” all kinds of otherwise uncoverable services to maximize federal matching funds. We disclosed this tragic abuse, which is now coming to haunt the state as the federal government wises up, in Long-Term Care Financing in New York:  How to Save Money While Serving the Needy (2011).