PLEASE DON’T: Wyoming Doctor Doesn’t Want Medicaid Expansion

For the 9th time a Medicaid expansion bill is before the Wyoming house and senate.

In Wyoming every other year is for passing bills. Every other year is for passing the states budget.

So it will be hard to get expansion passed during the 2023 session, which is a budget session.

Supporters of Medicaid expansion said Tuesday they might try attaching their initiative to a budget amendment to get it passed.

Backers say it will expand coverage to around 27,000 residents who don't have it. They point to the money that will pour into our state hospitals from the federal government.

In the audio file below you will hear from a Wyoming doctor who called Wyoming's morning talk show to explain why Medicaid expansion would be a bad idea.

Medicaid expansion has been a failure for those states that have tried it. Lots of spending, little benefit.

Obamacare allowed states to expand Medicaid.

The federal government initially covered the entire cost of expansion.

But that did not last long.

By 2020, it will only cover 90% of the cost and leave states to cover the remaining 10%.

That percentage continues to drop.

Then there was the overflow of people. Twice as many enrolled as was expected, according to a report from the Foundation for Government Accountability. Each new enrollee cost about 76% more than projected.

States are now drowning in Medicaid debt. North Dakota, expansion cost 163% more than expected over a two-and-a-half-year period. In Louisiana, it cost 115% more over one year. Today, about 1 in every 3 state dollars goes to Medicaid.

This debt keeps climbing. Medicaid spending for adults covered under the expansion will hit $938 billion.

Here in Wyoming, opponents include medical professionals like Dr. John Mansell from Gillette, who called the Wake Up Wyoming morning show to explain why physicians and hospitals in the state oppose Medicaid expansion.

In their opposition they point to the overflow of people in each state that expanded, which was far above the numbers predicted, thus breaking the bank. Also the money that comes from D.C. ends up falling far short of what was promised in every case.

Listen to the call here:

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