Hospitals Would See Medicaid Funds Slashed If Hill Fails to Act

Over $8 billion in federal funding for safety net hospitals will be cut starting Oct. 1 unless Congress postpones or delays the latest reduction in Medicaid Disproportionate Share Hospital payments.

The payments are scheduled to be cut because the Affordable Care Act calls for the reductions in DSH payments, which provide supplemental income to hospitals that serve a large proportion of low-income or uninsured patients, at the start of each fiscal year under the assumption that the need for the payments would shrink each year as more Americans enrolled in health-care coverage through Obamacare. Yet millions of Americans remain uninsured. ...