TennCare Waiver Extended Until Jan. 31 to Allow for Funding Negotiations With Federal Government
CMS has granted TennCare, Tennessee's Medicaid managed care program, a 30-day extension of its current waiver to allow the state and federal government to continue negotiations over how the program will be funded in the future, the AP/Memphis Commercial Appeal reports. With the extension, TennCare will operate under its current rules through at least Jan. 31. At issue is the level of funding the federal government, which covers two-thirds of TennCare's costs, will provide for the $5.6 billion program. The state says that since TennCare started in 1994, the federal government has saved $740 million because the program operates as a managed care plan and not as a traditional Medicaid program. State officials have requested a 12% per year increase in funding over the next three years, which would effectively "tap" into those savings. "We project that at the end of three years, at 12% growth per year, we still would have saved the federal government $228 million over the life of the waiver," TennCare spokesperson Lola Potter said. The state is attempting to "lock" in the additional federal funding before it submits Gov. Don Sundquist's (R) plan to "overhaul" the program's waiver, Potter added (Sharp, AP/Memphis Commercial Appeal, 1/4). The governor's proposal would scale back the program to a managed care plan -- called TennCare Medicaid -- for Medicaid-eligible residents, and would also create TennCare Standard, which would offer benefits similar to those under a commercial managed care plan to low-income and poor adults and children with no access to group insurance, and to the uninsurable. The proposal would also create TennCare Assist, which would offer premium assistance to low-income workers to purchase private health insurance (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 12/19/01).
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