Take Note: Members of the House Committee on Energy & Commerce are drafting a budget which is highly likely to propose severe cuts to Medicaid. Whatever form those cuts take, they are likely to disproportionately harm people with disabilities, including people living with serious mental illness and autism spectrum disorders, their families, the communities in which they reside, and the professionals and organizations who care for them.
Take Action: Contact your Senators and Representatives – let them know your story and how cuts to Medicaid will hurt you and your loved ones with serious mental illness and autism spectrum disorders (ASD).
Directly call the House Committee on Energy & Commerce and the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions and share your concerns with the staff of those committees.
Background Information:
Mental Health News Education, Inc., the publisher of Behavioral Health News and Autism Spectrum News, is a non-partisan, non-profit organization. Its mission is “… improving the lives of individuals living with autism, mental health challenges, and substance use disorders while also supporting their families, caregivers, and the professional communities that serve them by providing a trusted source of science-based information, education, advocacy, and quality resources in the community.”
You should know that extraordinary budgetary circumstances are currently playing out in Congress, which will potentially have enormous consequences for the groups our publications serve. House Committee on Energy & Commerce (E&C), which has jurisdiction over Medicare and Medicaid, has been directed to cut $880 billion dollars over ten years from the programs for which it has responsibility. The markup for that bill is slated to occur on May 7, 2025.
Analysis from the Congressional Budget Office suggests that the E&C Committee will be unable to reach its goal without significant reductions to Medicaid. Inevitably, such cuts would have dire consequences for the treatment and recovery of individuals with serious mental illness and ASD.
The details of healthcare finance, including Medicaid, are very complex. Over recent years, the number of Medicaid beneficiaries significantly expanded due to passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). Currently, there are 6.9 million Medicaid beneficiaries in New York, approximately 10% of whom are disabled, including those with serious mental illness and ASD. New Yorkers with serious mental illness and ASD enjoy access to a broad array of recovery-oriented services that depend on Medicaid for their financing. After the FFCRA expired in March 2023, almost a million New Yorkers lost their coverage under Medicaid. The efforts of several states to add work requirements for Medicaid eligibility were blocked by the courts. Arkansas had such a requirement in place for one year before it was ended; during that year, those with mental health disabilities and ASD disproportionately lost their eligibility.
Medicaid cuts can be effectuated by reducing the federal share contribution, shifting federal payments to block grants or per-capita grants, curbing provider taxes, or by reinstituting work requirements. We anticipate that any or all of these may be employed and that the consequences for Medicaid beneficiaries with serious mental illness and ASD would be catastrophic.
In offering this summary of what may happen to Medicaid, we are joining with many advocacy organizations working on behalf of those living with serious mental illness and ASD in urging that you as a concerned citizen make your voice heard. Hopefully, by acting in concert, we can make a difference!
To learn more about the Mental Health News Education Board of Directors, view the full listing here. For questions or correspondence, please contact David Minot, Executive Director, at dminot@mhnews.org.
