Oklahoma is second state allowed to extend health plan outside Obamacare

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Oklahoma is second state allowed to extend health plan outside Obamacare

By Heide Brandes
OKLAHOMA CITY | Fri Sep 6, 2013 4:06pm EDT

(Reuters) - The federal government has granted Oklahoma a one-year extension to operate its own healthcare program, Governor Mary Fallin said on Friday, making it the second state this week to receive such an exception under President Barack Obama's medical reform law.

Oklahoma is one of several Republican-led states that have rejected federal government incentives to expand the Medicaid healthcare program for the poor and declined to set up its own health insurance exchange for consumers to shop for insurance.

Fallin, who has repeatedly rejected the Affordable Care Act, said Oklahoma had negotiated an extension through 2014 for its Insure Oklahoma program.

The program created in 2005 provides health insurance for nearly 30,000 low-income, working residents, both individually and for those working for participating small businesses.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/06/us-usa-healthcare-oklahoma-idUSBRE98510O20130906

[SheilaT]

1. My first thought is to ask exactly how good

is this program, compared to those within Obamacare.

I happen to live in a state with a Republican governor, although a Democratic controlled legislature (New Mexico) and we seem to be going ahead with a good Obamacare thing. I'll admit I'm not paying real close attention, because I not only have a very good health plan through my job, but I also just turned 65 so now I'm on Medicare.

Recently I was somewhere and had a brief conversation with a woman two or three years older than I am, and mentioned that I just became eligible for Medicare. She brightened up and told me that things had become far easier for her now that she has Medicare. Granted, I don't know the specifics of her life or health, but she was wonderfully positive about Medicare.

Medicare for All. Period.