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PARKERSBURG -- West Virginia could fare the worst among states under the Senate's version of a health care bill, according to the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
"The Senate GOP health bill would be a disaster for West Virginia and is fatally flawed," Executive Director Ted Boettner said. "No amount of tweaks can fix the fundamental problems that make this bill so harmful to the people of our state: failing to ensure access to affordable coverage, failing to combat the opioid crisis, cutting Medicaid deeply and ending our expansion, and harming rural health care providers."
Senate Republican leaders last week unveiled their health care proposal, Better Care Reconciliation Act, and were hoping to advance it to a vote; however, the vote was delayed until after the July 4 holiday by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell when he lacked the votes to approve a procedural motion to proceed to final debate and votes on the legislation.
The Senate version is similar to the House Republican plan, the American Health Care Act, which is basically to repeal the Affordable Care Act passed under President Barack Obama. Millions of people will lose insurance coverage under the care act in either plan, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Both U.S. senators from West Virginia have said they oppose the Senate health care plan. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., announced her opposition after McConnell said there would be no vote until after the holidays. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, announced his opposition in a joint statement with Capito.
In West Virginia, under the Senate bill, 218,000 West Virginians would lose coverage in 2022, increasing the uninsured rate in the non-elderly population by more than 300 percent, the largest increase in any state, the Center on Budget said. One in seven non-elderly residents in West Virginia who otherwise would lose coverage, the center said.
Also, tens of thousands more residents would face worse or less affordable health coverage, including West Virginians with job-based coverage, the center said.
According to the center, the Senate bill would cut the Medicaid program through which many residents with disabilities get their coverage, will increase premiums, deductibles or both for 30,000 West Virginians, especially seniors, who purchase health coverage through the marketplace, weakens protections for West Virginians who purchase individual market coverage, including people with pre-existing conditions and could result in the return of annual and lifetime limits for a significant share of the roughly 700,000 West Virginians with job-based coverage.
The center also predicts it will be harder for addicts to obtain treatment.
"There are many opportunities for Congress to improve our health care system," Boettner said. "But this bill can't be fixed: the Senate needs to start over and take a different, bipartisan approach."
In the meantime, the American Medical Association on Monday released a poll that said 19 percent of West Virginians have a favorable view of the House's health care version. The poll shows West Virginians have a low opinion of the House bill and are opposed to numerous provisions of the bill in the Senate, the association said.
The survey also found overwhelming opposition to reducing spending on Medicaid.
Among the findings, the poll said:
* 84 percent of those surveyed support being able to buy insurance across state lines.
* Residents are nearly equally divided on eliminating the ACA requirement that all health plans sold must provide a standard set of government-established benefits, including mental health services, addiction treatment, maternity care and preventive health services with no out-of-pocket costs.
* 60 percent of respondents to 32 percent oppose a change that would allow insurance companies to charge consumers higher rates if they have pre-existing conditions and allowed their coverage to lapse.
The poll was conducted by Voter/Consumer Research by telephone of 400 registered voters June 19-22.