Physicians Across the Country Continue to Push Back Against Proposed Drastic Cuts to Medicaid and Failure to Address Medicare
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Following last week’s statement from MSSNY President Dr. David Jakubowicz, MD, telling Congress to Go Back to the Drawing Board to Ensure Patients Get the Care They Need, MSSNY this week joined in a letter to US Senate leaders from 47 state medical associations to urge the US Senate to reject the damaging cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, and medical student loan programs in the Senate Finance Committee draft budget reconciliation bill, noting that “these cuts will seriously harm access to health care for all Americans”
Physicians are urged to continue to send communications to their Congressional representatives Urge Congress to oppose steep cuts to Medicaid. As previously reported, the US House of Representatives recently passed by a single vote (215-214)their reconciliation budget package that would cut hundreds of billions in funding for Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act.
Unfortunately, the Senate doubled down on the potential damage to our healthcare system by deepening Medicaid cuts and failing to include any language to prevent future cuts to Medicare physician payment, which has been cut each year over the last several years.
It is estimated that these changes could cause 1.5 million New Yorkers to lose existing health insurance coverage. It also estimated that these changes, if enacted, could cause New York to lose $13.5 billion annually in federal funding Governor Hochul and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries Warn of Detrimental Impacts , which could cause steep cuts to various New York healthcare and insurance programs.
Furthermore, the proposed Medicaid changes raise grave concerns that they will jeopardize state funding for the payment of care delivery including required documentation of having worked 80 hours per month for people ages 18-64, with a start date of December 31, 2026, more frequent eligibility redeterminations for Medicaid eligibility, impose co-pays on Medicaid beneficiaries who earn more than 100% of the federal poverty level (FPL), prevent states from implementing new health insurance tax mechanisms to draw down federal dollars such as the recently enacted Managed Care Organization (MCO) tax in New York, among several others.
MSSNY also continues to work with a broad coalition of patient and health care provider groups from across New York State, including joining a host of sign on letters to members of New York’s Congressional Delegation including NY-Delegation-Letter-Protect-Medicaid-January-2025.pdf and https://medicaidmattersny.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/NY-Delegation-Letter-Protect-Medicaid-April-2025.pdf, urging them to oppose proposed cuts to Medicaid and other essential publicly financed health insurance programs.
