ADAPT Challenges Democrats to End Medicaid Institutional Bias

April 25, 2005 

For Information Contact: 
Bob Kafka 512-431-4085
Marsha Katz 406-544-9504

(Denver, CO) People with disabilities of all ages are being threatened daily by actions taking place inside and outside the Washington, D.C. beltway. The most recent assault is a statement from the Democratic Party issued by Rep. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) extolling the virtues of nursing homes while completely ignoring the more desired and legally required home and community-based services that prevent disabled and older Americans from being forced into nursing homes and other institutions.

In response to the statement by Rep Brown, who is also the ranking member of the Health Sub Committee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, ADAPT challenges the Democratic Party and every individual Democratic governor and Democrat in Congress to endorse removing the institutional bias from the nation’s Medicaid program. 

“My first reaction to Rep. Brown’s statement was ‘what was he thinking?”, said Jim Etzel, ADAPT Organizer from Ohio. “That was followed quickly by a deep sense of outrage that a member of Congress from my state would be opposing Medicaid cuts by promoting something that takes away my freedom, is not what any American wants in their future, and is totally opposite of every national initiative and every national poll on long term care.”

Mark McClellan, Director of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, has spoken publicly many times on the need to end the institutional bias in Medicaid, and to replace the current mandate for Medicaid to fund nursing homes with a mandate for Medicaid to provide “long term care services and supports” that would automatically include home and community-based services whenever people choose them. This change would assure that government funded long term care would conform to both the U.S. Supreme Court Olmstead decision, and the President’s New Freedom Initiative, which mandated that all federal departments operate in accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Despite McClellan’s promotion of a “home and community first” policy, President George W. Bush is proposing a 2006 budget that drastically cuts Medicaid, and is pushing Medicaid block granting to the states. While the U. S. Senate budget did not contain cuts to Medicaid, the budget proposed by the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives contained what have been labeled as draconian cuts to the nation’s Medicaid program. ADAPT is adamantly opposed to both the notion of Medicaid block granting, and to any attempts by Congress to cut or cap the Medicaid program.

“It appears that advancing political agendas in D.C. by knocking the disability community around has become an equal opportunity sport, with both major political parties taking their best shot,” said Bob Kafka, National Organizer for ADAPT. “Even people who say they are our friends, or who we thought were our friends, are engaging in one action after another that threatens our freedom, risks our lives, and removes our civil rights. We will not let these actions go unopposed.”

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Background:

BROWN JOINS CAPITOL HILL MEDICAID TALKS April 21, 2005

(WASHINGTON) Congressman Sherrod Brown issued the following statement during a Medicaid roundtable Thursday on Capitol Hill. 

Also in attendance were: Democratic Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton (NY), Max Baucus (MT), John Rockefeller (WV), Jeff Bingaman (NM), Debbie Stabenow (MI); Democratic Reps. John Dingell (MI), Stephanie Herseth (SD), Rep. Lois Capps (CA); Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm (MI)); Phyllis Craig, Maine Senior Citizen; Peter Thomas, Advocate for People with Disabilities; and Fran Kuhns, Nursing Home CEO.

"There are many reasons to oppose the Medicaid cuts, none more compelling than the impact on nursing home residents. How can we subject these Americans to the likelihood of substandard care, or even eviction? If we are truly a caring society, we can't.

"Medicaid cuts would not only jeopardize the 5 million elderly Americans who would lack access to nursing home care without it. These cuts would place every nursing home resident in this country at risk. Each year, nursing homes serve more than 2.5 million Americans. Medicaid covers 70% of these Americans. 

"The financial viability of nursing homes hinges on adequate Medicaid reimbursement. The very health and safety of nursing home residents hinges on adequate Medicaid reimbursement. Think about it. About 75% of a nursing home's operating budget goes to paying nurses, nursing assistants and other staff. 

"If we make deep cuts in Medicaid, how will nursing homes respond? They will cut staff. They won't have any choice. Medicaid already runs on fumes, and it's being hit from all sides. In my home state of Ohio, the Governor plans on cutting $90 million from Medicaid nursing homes. It will be the third year of nursing home cuts. 

"If the federal government makes further cuts in nursing home funding, I have no doubt that people who none of us would directly abandon will be abandoned. That's because Medicaid doesn't generate nursing home costs, it finances those costs. Medicaid meets the need, it doesn't create it. Trying to reduce nursing home costs by cutting Medicaid is like trying to reduce your rent by tearing up your rent check.

"You can't eliminate a responsibility by abdicating it. Proponents of the Medicaid cuts tell us not to worry, the cuts will only affect 'optional' Medicaid populations. More than half of the 5 million elderly Americans on Medicaid are 'optional.' More than half of all Medicaid-covered nursing home residents are 'optional.' 

"How many people 'choose' to enter a nursing home? If we cut these Americans from Medicaid, they have nowhere to turn. Our assistance isn't 'optional.' Americans care about people in need. Some 2/3 of people in nursing homes have no surviving spouse or relatives. 

In the broadest sense of the word, we are their family. We must not neglect them.

"This nation has to confront the realities of an aging population, the reality that health care needs and costs are growing, the reality that long-term care needs and costs are growing. More than one-third of all Americans who reach age 65 will enter a nursing home at some point in their lives. Absent a universal long-term care system, there will always be Americans who cannot afford that care.

"Starving Medicaid is not only the coward's way out, it is the fool's."

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