Facts check of Trump's claims on Medicaid cuts in the GOP calculation | Health news

A law of Medicaid promoted by the Republicans proposes considerable cuts for the health insurance program for Americans with lower incomes. However, US President Donald Trump said that the legislation would change Medicaid in a way that only combats “waste, fraud and abuse”, a phrase that he repeated seven times over a few minutes.

“We don't make anything meaningful,” said the Republican President. “The only thing we cut is waste, fraud and abuse. … We do not change Medicaid and do not change Medicare and do not change social security.”

The House of Representatives passed the legislative template on Thursday and now moved to the Senate, where it could be changed. The house version does not aim directly at social security or Medicare. But it changes medicaid, including in a way that corresponds to the Republican priorities.

The congress's impartial congress office assumed that at least 8.6 million people will lose cover due to the changes.

“Relatively little of the legislative template is clearly related to the attempt to reduce fraud or error,” said Leighton Ku, director of the George Washington University Health Policy. “There are some minor provisions about things like the search for dead people who are enrolled or address addresses. However, the main provisions are by no means fraud, waste or mistakes. They are things that reflect the political preferences of the republican architects.”

Robin Rudowitz, Vice President and Director of the Medicaid program and the non -insured persons at the Health Policy Research Group KFF, agreed that the extent of the laws of the law continues, said Trump. “The extent of the federal expenditure and the resulting loss of coverage goes far beyond the exertion of fraud and abuse,” she said.

The most important provisions of the draft law could be made before the final voices and in force, while others can be added.

The White House did not respond to an inquiry for this factual control.

How the Federal Government defines waste, fraud and misuse

The centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Federal Authority, which operates Medicaid, offers official definitions for these three terms:

• Fraud: “If someone knowingly deceives, hidden or portrayed, to receive money or property from a program for the healthcare system. Medicare or Medicaid fraud are considered criminal law.”
• Waste: “Overuse of services or other practices that lead directly or indirectly at unnecessary costs for every health service program. Examples of waste lead excessive citizen visits, prescribe more medication than necessary and order excessive laboratory tests.”
• Misuse: “If health service providers or suppliers carry out measures that lead directly or indirectly at unnecessary costs for a program for healthcare. Abuse includes every practice that does not offer the patient to have medically necessary services or meet professionally recognized standards”, e.g.

Some invoice provisions can be referred to as target waste, fraud and abuse

A provision in the legislative template obliges the states to confirm at least every six months than every year according to applicable law at least every six months. Another would determine stricter requirements for checking the addresses and other information from the participants.

Such efforts could save expenses for non -eligible persons and classified as a waste prevention measure.

Other provisions are more ideological than on waste, fraud and abuse

Some of the highest provisions of the draft law are more likely to be driven by the ideology in the expansive of the program and the types of people who should benefit from it.

One of these provisions concerns people in the United States without documents.

Since it is already against the law to issue the Federal Medicaid agent for undocumented people, the law is pursuing a different approach: the states should make it difficult for the states to rely exclusively on state funds in order to cover immigrants in the United States. At the moment, 14 states and the District of Columbia are coinciding children regardless of their immigration status, and seven states of plus Washington, DC, at least some adults who also live in the USA without documents.

For these states, the draft law reduces the federal government's proportion of 90 percent to 80 percent.

In other words, if a state continues to cover without papers, it will not only have immigrants in the country without documents. Household printing in these countries could mean that some citizens also lose part of their advantages or their entire medicaid cover.

Another provision includes work requirements. In the law, people between the ages of 19 and 64 would receive Medicaid as part of the expected Care ACT expansion, which was passed during the democratic administration of former President Barack Obama, for at least 80 hours a month of qualified activities (e.g.

Studies have shown that the vast majority of people who have to work under similar requirements have already been used or have a qualified exception – but many are thrown by Medicaid because they do not keep pace with the mandatory documents.

“The work requirements are not about waste, fraud and abuse. They change the rules as to who is suitable for the program, and they add an immense series of bureaucratic obstacles and bureaucracy for justified people to keep reporting,” said Benjamin D -Summers, Professor of Healthcare Economics and Medicine at Medical Homes and Medicine Chan -School of the Chan school in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -Chool in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School in the Chan -School of the Chan Chan school in the Chan school in the hard school and the Harvard medicine.

A KFF analysis in March showed that fraud in Medicare and Medicaid mainly occurs from providers. “There are checks about fraud, waste and abuse both at the federal and state and at the country level,” wrote KFF.

Another draft law prohibits Medicaid funds that were issued for non -profit organizations that mainly do family planning or reproductive services that would affect the planned parenthood and other organizations that deliver abortions.

After all, at least two provisions focus on saving money. For the first time, one would demand that states impose 35 US dollars for many types of care. The other would limit the retrospective coverage after the application for Medicaid to one month before the application from 90 days. These provisions do not indicate how they would trigger waste, fraud and abuse.

“The” Medicaid savings “in this legislation are primarily from the enrollment of the program,” said Sommer.

Our decision

Trump said that the house bill “Medicaid does not change” and only “cuts off, fraud and abuse”.

The legislation includes provisions that could improve the detection of beneficiaries that are not justified.

However, other provisions would change medicaid in such a way that they would adapt to Trump's ideology and republican priorities. The draft law would stimulate states to hire their own means to cover people without papers in the USA. It requires people to work or carry out other approved activities to secure advantages. And it prohibits Medicaid payments to non -profit organizations such as planned parenthood, which, among other things, provide abortions.

Other changes aim to reduce the costs, including the impression of copays and a shorter window for a retroactive coverage. These provisions do not indicate how they cut off waste, fraud or abuse.

We evaluate the explanation INCORRECT.