Medicaid change will affect almost all recipients in Rio Grande Valley

[TexasTowelie]

The rollout on March 1 of managed-care Medicaid for the Rio Grande Valley and beyond is “a historic policy shift,” State Rep. Richard Peña Raymond, D-Laredo, said this week.

The change is expected to affect more than 400,000 Medicaid clients in a 10-county service area. They were asked to enroll in managed-care plans by last Friday.

In the face of the state budget crisis last year, proponents said the change would cut costs because managed care would help avoid duplicate services for clients. Those who had been against managed care for Medicaid said the likely reduced reimbursements would hurt services and clients.

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Providers have expressed reservations about how quickly the massive rollout will occur, and questions about service linger. The affected counties are Cameron, Duval, Hidalgo, Jim Hogg, Maverick, McMullen, Starr, Webb, Willacy and Zapata.

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/articles/rio-136955-grande-valley.html

[sonias]

1. Another brick in the wall

These thousand cuts are eventually going to make things very much worse. This area has the highest poverty rate in the country. Not just the state but the whole country. You can not squeeze any more money from people who just don't have it. People are just going to go without their medications if they can't afford them.

It will not be pretty. But the republicans don't care anyway. These are people who don't vote republican. That's when they bother to vote that is.