State News

The Ohio Department of Medicaid seeks to update its managed care setup with a focus on population health, meeting the needs of children with complex needs and reducing administrative hurdles for patients and healthcare providers, according to Health Policy Institute of Ohio. The state has invited privately operated managed care organizations to submit applications. These changes are the result of comments provided by beneficiaries, physicians, hospitals and other healthcare providers. Many highlighted concerns with the current system that forced families with children in need of intensive and costly services to relinquish custody for their children to be eligible for Medicaid. Under the plan, Ohio Rise, some youth would qualify for modified eligibility requirements, allowing them to receive assistance while remaining in their family’s custody

California will join 28 states that allow nurse practitioners to practice independently, in an effort to address workforce shortages creating barriers to care, according to The Sacramento Bee. The new law will allow nurse practitioners to open their own practices after a three-year period of operating under a doctor’s supervision, beginning in 2023. The state’s Board of Registered Nursing will establish a commission to oversee implementation and practice requirements, including nurse practitioners’ obligation to notify patients that they are not physicians.

Citing challenges to addiction treatment access in Colorado, a new state program has transformed six RVs into mobile clinics to reach isolated communities, reports Kaiser Health News. As brick-and-mortar addiction clinics have closed or stopped taking new patients due to COVID-19, these mobile clinics have become more crucial to rural residents seeking addiction care. Each RV has a nurse, a counselor and a peer specialist who has personal experience with addiction. And because broadband access is often limited in rural areas, these RVs provide a telehealth bridge to medical providers in cities, so that rural residents can be prescribed medicine to fight addiction and overdose. 

California’s governor signed legislation meant to bring down the cost of prescription drugs for taxpayers, employers and consumers, according to a press release from the governor’s office. The first-in-the-nation law tasks the California Health and Human Services Agency (CHHS) with developing manufacturing partnerships to produce or distribute generic prescription drugs, thereby increasing competition in markets that have driven up prices for consumers and helping address critical drug shortages. CHHS will focus on manufacturing drugs that could produce the biggest cost savings and will submit a report to the legislature analyzing how its efforts have impacted competition, access and costs for those drugs.

Virginia decisionmakers announced more than $8.4 million in community development block grants for 14 projects to help rural communities in Virginia, according to CBS 19 News. The funding can be used to help with COVID-19 response and recovery activities including, but not limited to: acquisition costs for telework or telemedicine services; business assistance for job training or re-tooling business services to reopen and adapt in a new environment; and construction or rehab of structures for shelters. For example, Wise County is using the funding to partner with Lunchbox276 to expand food programing options for approximately 500 children and families. 

Since August, the rates of COVID cases and deaths per million people for Black residents were the same or lower than those for white residents, according to data provided by Michigan’s health department, Modern Healthcare reports. The racial disparity of coronavirus' impact was prevalent in the early days of the pandemic, with Black residents representing 29.4 percent of cases and 40.7 percent of deaths, despite making up just 15 percent of Michigan's population. State officials credit the work of the Coronavirus Task Force on Racial Disparities for implementing programs like the Rapid Response Grant program, which awarded 31 grants from federal CARES Act funding worth $20 million to help provide underserved communities with food and housing assistance and access to COVID-19 and flu testing.

Wyoming’s governor has created a task force to come up with legislative policy solutions to tackle the state’s high healthcare costs, according to the Star Tribune. The group is made up of a diverse and broad set of healthcare, state and legislative officials and has established four priorities: evaluate current healthcare services in Wyoming; determining the service priorities that are needed for the state and assessing accessibility of service priorities within specific geographic areas; determining what factors are driving high healthcare costs; and formulating solutions to provide equitable, affordable access to high-risk populations. A variety of policy solutions are on the table—including an examination of what a single-payer system would look like in Wyoming.

An analysis of employer claims data by RAND found stark differences in the prices private health plans pay for inpatient and outpatient services at Kansas hospitals, reports KCUR. Prices at the University of Kansas Hospital and Overland Park Regional Medical Center were among the highest in the country, while prices at Lawrence Memorial Hospital were lower than those observed across the state and nationally. Additionally, private health plans paid more than twice the Medicare rate for hospital care in 2018. Unwarranted variation in healthcare prices, combined with a lack of transparency, makes it difficult for employers to make educated decisions when shopping for health plans to cover their employees. 

The presidential administration announced a rule allowing the importation of some prescription drugs from Canada, clearing the way for Florida and other states to implement programs to bring medications across the border, according to Kaiser Health News. Florida’s law—approved in 2019—would set up two importation programs. The first would focus on getting drugs for state programs such as Medicaid, the Department of Corrections and county health departments. The second program would be geared to the broader state population. Prices are cheaper in Canada due to limitations on how much pharmaceutical companies can charge for medicines. State officials said they expect the program to save the state about $150 million annually. The rule, however, does not allow states to import all types of medications, including biologic drugs such as insulin.