Gov. Ralph DLG Torres joined the chief executives of Guam, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, and American Samoa in calling for \u201cneed-based\u201d Medicaid funding for fair and equal footing across the board.<\/p>\n
Torres joined Guam Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero, USVI Gov. Albert Bryan Jr., American Samoa Gov. Lolo M. Moliga, and Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda V. Garced in a letter to congressional leaders dated Sept. 12, 2019, that called for fair, equitable healthcare coverage for territories\u2014similar to what is available to the 50 U.S. states and District of Columbia.<\/p>\n
The territorial governors cited the following advantages when Medicaid funding in the territories is fair: Eliminate the arbitrary cap on annual federal Medicaid funding; increase the federal matching rate for the territories\u2019 Medicaid expenditures; update hospital reimbursements\u2019 and increase funding for prescription drug coverage to low-income seniors, the letter noted.<\/p>\n
This comes as both federal funding provided to U.S. territories under Public Law 115-123, or the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, and the Affordable Care Act\u2014also known as ObamaCare\u2014expire on Sept. 30, 2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis reversion to the earlier status quo will have grave implications for approximately four million Americans living in the U.S. territories\u2026,\u201d the letter noted.<\/p>\n
All five governors of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the CNMI signed off on the letter.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf Congress does not act before Sept. 30, 2019\u2026our enrollees may lose their Medicaid coverage and access to compensated care aimed at treating life-threatening disease and conditions and preventing needless deaths,\u201d the letter noted. \u201cIt is our hope that Congress will work with the U.S. territories to reverse course and resolve the Medicaid funding cliff. Failure to do so will constitute a man-made disaster and a blot on the human rights record of the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n
The letter took note of the recovering USVI and Puerto Rico, which were hit by hurricanes Irma and Maria in September 2017. It also took note of Super Typhoon Yutu, which struck the CNMI late October 2018, referring to Yutu as the \u201cstrongest storm to hit American soil in over 30 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLosing their medical insurance is the last thing our vulnerable population needs as they face the ongoing impact of these violent storms on local economies and on their physical and mental health,\u201d the letter stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gov. Ralph DLG Torres joined the chief executives of Guam, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[15763,26,1666,21346],"class_list":["post-308317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","tag-american-samoa-gov","tag-cnmi","tag-guam-gov","tag-puerto-rico-gov"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308317\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}