Amendment 2 commands attention

Editor’s note: The following is based on information presented by an organization called Healthcare for Missouri. It purports to be a grassroots, nonpartisan effort led by Missourians, including doctors, nurses, healthcare advocates, civic and business leaders, and Missourians who need healthcare. For more information, visit healthcareformissouri.org
Amendment 2 will appear on the August primary ballot. This proposal is to expand Medicaid, to deliver healthcare for 230,000 Missourians and bring more than a billion a year back from Washington to keep rural hospitals open and boost the economy.
“People who don’t have insurance face a lot of challenges,” said Paula Baker, Freeman Health System President/CEO. “One of the challenges is their inability to get medical care when they need it and often, they don’t have a primary care physician. As a result, they let health issues continue until the severity of symptoms drives them to an emergency room, which is the most expensive venue for medical care.”
If approved by voters, Medicaid expansion would help hundreds of thousands of hardworking Missourians and their families in the coverage gap, most with jobs that don’t provide health coverage and who are unable to afford private insurance. That includes Missourians on the frontlines of the coronavirus outbreak, working essential, low-wage jobs in grocery stores, as delivery drivers, in nursing homes, hospitals, and elsewhere.
The expansion of Medicaid in Missouri would also help counter the dearth of healthcare in rural Missouri. Ten rural hospitals in the state have closed in recent years according to the Missouri Hospital Association, giving our state one of the country’s highest such closure rates.
Thirty-six other states have already expanded Medicaid, including neighboring Arkansas, where officials reported using savings from the expansion of more than $400 million during the last three years alone to cut state income taxes and reduce payments previously allocated to the uninsured.
The Missouri border states of Illinois, Kentucky, Nebraska, and Iowa have also opted for Medicaid expansion. None of those three dozen states have reversed course, with many reporting positive economic outcomes.