March 2002 • Volume 8 • Number 3 |
•Chapters lobby for change•
Sometimes health care issues surface in tandem in state legislatures and the U.S. Congress. A federal bill the AAFP supports -- Start Healthy, Stay Healthy -- would encourage states to provide what the Colorado AFP (see story "Colorado AFP speaks up - Children's insurance program should cover maternity care") is seeking: maternity care coverage under the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
Start Healthy, Stay Healthy, S. 1016, would also avoid the question of redefining child in eligibility criteria for federal benefits. The bill, instead, would let states cover income-eligible pregnant women under SCHIP and automatically enroll their newborns in SCHIP. The federal government would supply about two-thirds of the funds for the coverage, and the states would provide one-third.
S. 1016 and the Colorado bill differ from the administration's approach. On Jan. 31, HHS issued a press release on its plan to redefine child so that states could, if they wished, extend SCHIP eligibility to children from conception to age 19. The plan may take effect after a 60-day comment period and analysis of responses. For the press release on the plan, see http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2002pres/20020131.html.
FP Report is published by the
AAFP News Department.
Copyright © 2002 by
American Academy of Family Physicians.