Republicans denying health coverage to thousands of veterans

[gollygee]

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/11/11/2922301/republicans-denying-health-care-coverage-thousands-veterans/

The GOP’s refusal to fully implement the Affordable Care Act will leave more than half of the nation’s uninsured working poor without access to health insurance and will also disadvantage military veterans.

While the health care law does not change the Veterans Health Administration or other military health care systems, the ACA does expand Medicaid to all uninsured Americans with incomes below 133 percent of the federal poverty line and could provide health care coverage to nearly half of all uninsured veterans. This population of approximately 1,314,000 veterans tends to “have served more recently, are younger, have lower levels of education, are less likely to be married, and are less connected to the labor force.” (According to a 2012 analysis from the Urban Institute, 48 percent of uninsured veterans are estimated to have incomes below the Medicaid eligibility threshold.)
Half of veterans who are insured, but report only relying on the Veterans Administration for their health care needs, could also “qualify for Medicaid to supplement their VA care under the expansion,” the analysis found.

Unfortunately, the states that have failed to grow Medicaid are home to higher rates of uninsured veterans than the states that expanded their programs. A ThinkProgress analysis of Urban Institute data found that the average rate of uninsurance among veterans in the 24 states that have not expanded Medicaid is 12 percent, while states that did expand Medicaid have an average veteran uninsurance rate of 9 percent.