Medicaid Disenrollment in June is Three times Higher than May 31
As you may recall, Angry Bear has discussed Medicaid purges, why they are happening, and who are impacted by disenrollment. You can find our commentaries here, here, and here. Most recently . . .
Medicaid Enrollment and Unwinding Tracker, KFF, June 20, 2023
At least 1,514,000 Medicaid enrollees have been disenrolled as of June 22, 2023, based on the most current data from 25 states and the District of Columbia. Overall, 37% of people with a completed renewal were disenrolled in reporting states while 63%, or 2.5 million enrollees, had their coverage renewed (three of the 25 reporting states do not provide data on renewed enrollees). Because not all states have publicly available data on total disenrollments, the data reported here undercount the actual number of disenrollments.
End of Month May, the numbers disenrolled was far lower and approximately one-third of what it was June 22nd. Many people were unsure of how to enroll. People polled were unsure they could be removed or believed they would not be removed. Many people had never been through a Medicaid renewal process. Many of those on Medicaid did not know how to recertify or were unsure. See chart below.
Across all states with available data, 73% of all people disenrolled had their coverage terminated for procedural reasons. There is also wide variation in rates of procedural disenrollments across states reporting this breakout, ranging from 95% in South Carolina to 28% in Iowa. Procedural disenrollments are cases where people are disenrolled because they did not complete the renewal process and can occur when the state has outdated contact information or because the enrollee does not understand or otherwise does not complete renewal packets within a specific timeframe. High procedural disenrollment rates are concerning because many people who are disenrolled for these paperwork reasons may still be eligible for Medicaid coverage.
Why Do We Tolerate Our Health Insurance Problem? MedPage Today