Covid Aid on Way to Health Providers for Poor, Uninsured (1)

The Department of Health and Human Services is distributing about $25 billion in long-awaited relief to doctors and hospitals that primarily treat low-income and uninsured patients and have been reeling from the coronavirus crisis.

The hospitals and doctors that are mostly paid by Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program haven’t had a direct conduit for Covid-19 funding since Congress enacted a health provider relief package in April. That’s because Medicaid and CHIP are run by states with federal distributions of cash, and the mechanism for getting money through those programs is complicated.

But the delay has raised concerns that ...