IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Advertiser: "Embrace the opportunity"

Tuesday, December 14, 2010  |  Contact: Lisa R. Faust; (225) 342-7913 or (225) 252-3579 (cell)

Advertiser: "Embrace the opportunity"
December 14, 2010
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With all the gathering gloom about state budget cuts, we've had one glimmering hope, and it's about health care: Because preventing illness is cheaper than curing it, financial incentives might be created to keep people well instead of socking the government when they're sick.
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State health officials are making a push to institute reforms in Medicaid that have been in the works since Jindal took office in 2008. We hope our lawmakers and taxpayers too will embrace the opportunity to make the state-federal system that covers 28 percent of Louisiana's people more efficient, more effective and available to more people.
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Greenstein said the new Medicaid eligibility standards could add another 600,000 people to the Louisiana Medicaid program. He said 188,000 of them may actually leave their current private insurance plans because they find themselves eligible for Medicaid.

That means it's vital for Louisiana to institute cost savings in Medicaid before the 2014 deadline. If the Jindal administration is right, the savings don't have to come at the expense of our state's neediest, most vulnerable people.