The $3.12 million increase was scheduled to arrive on July 1, but there were delays within the bureaucracy at the Department of Health and Human Services, he added.
He said the CNMI Medicaid office asked his office to “shake the tree” at HHS and “we were able to get Medicaid their money within a few days.”
“ ‘Obamacare,’ as Republican critics love to call the new health care reform law, tripled the amount of federal Medicaid funding the NMI receives between 2011 and 2019,” Sablan said.
“We will get a total of $150 million during this period. It also lowered the local match required from 50 to 45 percent — a change worth $15 million to the commonwealth. The Obamacare increase means more help for more of our low-income patients. A recent report by the Harvard School of Public Health documents the benefits of Medicaid, which reduces financial strain on households, increases access to care, and improves overall health,” he added.
Economic conditions
In other news, Congresswoman Donna Christensen of the Virgin Islands, Congresswoman Madeleine Bordallo of Guam, Congressman Eni Faleomavaega of American Samoa and Sablan banded together in a request last week for an oversight hearing on economic conditions in the islands we represent.
According to Sablan, “Our letter to Chairman John Fleming, R-La., outlined the problems in each area, but the recent Bureau of Economic Analysis report of a 20 percent drop in gross domestic product in the NMI stood out as particularly dire. The decline in tourism and the end of the garment industry have left deep wounds in our economy and weakened the ability of our local government to act. A hearing will focus the attention of the federal government and the Congress on the need for more federal help with the economic recovery and the further development of the U.S. insular areas.”
