MONTGOMERY – The new COVID-19 recovery stimulus legislation, known as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, was signed into law by President Joe Biden on Thursday. This law brings back federally financed incentives for states to expand Medicaid, but with a new angle this time. If Alabama expands Medicaid, the state would receive a 5-percentage-point increase in federal funding for its traditional Medicaid coverage ‒ a larger population than the expansion group ‒ for two years.
This federal boost could mean an additional $940 million for Alabama Medicaid over a span of two years, early estimates show. The additional federal dollars from this increase would exceed the full state cost of Medicaid expansion for a number of years. Advocates for Medicaid expansion say this is a unique opportunity for the state to expand coverage.
Some 300,000 Alabamians are in the health coverage gap. That means they earn too much to qualify for Medicaid under Alabama’s stringent income limit but too little to qualify for subsidized marketplace plans under the Affordable Care Act. This includes more than 5,000 veterans and 8,000 of their family members. Tens of thousands more Alabamians are struggling to pay for coverage they can’t truly afford.
Medicaid expansion has proved to be politically popular. Nearly 70% of Alabamians support expanding Medicaid, including 64% of Republicans, a recent Cover Alabama poll administered by Cygnal found. These numbers increased when respondents were asked if they would support expanding Medicaid using federal funding.
The Cover Alabama Coalition calls on Gov. Kay Ivey and the Legislature to act quickly to expand Medicaid and make Alabama stronger and healthier. More than 40 Cover Alabama partners released statements in support of Medicaid expansion. They are available in their entirety below.
Quotes from Cover Alabama Coalition partners
“This law is a much-needed step toward closing the health coverage gap in Alabama. The American Rescue Plan Act would provide Alabama with financial incentives to expand Medicaid coverage at last. We have no time to waste. Tens of thousands of people have died in the South ‒ my home ‒ because they couldn’t afford to get the health care they needed. Medicaid expansion is the single biggest step Alabama can take to weather and recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and move our state forward. Congress did their job. Now it is time for Governor Ivey and our state lawmakers to do theirs and immediately expand Medicaid in Alabama.” ‒ Jane Adams, Campaign Director, Alabama Arise and the Cover Alabama Coalition
“One in five people in the U.S. have a mental health condition, but only half get the treatment they need. Medicaid expansion allows for access to coverage and care, which is essential for people with mental illness and substance use disorder to successfully manage their condition and get on a path of recovery. Thanks to the passage of the American Rescue Act of 2021, the state of Alabama will receive the much-needed funds to expand Medicaid, and therefore, we urge the governor and legislative leaders to act quickly so that Alabamians with mental health conditions gain access to vital care as soon as possible.” ‒ Holly McCorkle, Executive Director, Alabama Council for Behavioral Healthcare
“Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King said, ‘The time is always right to do what is right.’ It’s time for Alabama to do right and expand Medicaid.” ‒ Scott Douglas, Executive Director, Greater Birmingham Ministries
“For more than eight years, Alabama leaders have pointed their fingers elsewhere to explain their lack of action on expanding Medicaid. While they have made excuses, thousands of our neighbors have died and dozens of health providers have closed their doors because patients can’t afford treatment. With the passage of the American Rescue Plan Act, Congress has removed any further cause for delay. Alabama can access an additional $940 million to offset the cost of Medicaid expansion ‒ but only if our leaders are willing to step up. We call upon Governor Ivey and legislative leaders to move forward immediately with a plan to bring millions of our tax dollars home to Alabama. Every day we wait is costing us tremendous resources for our state’s health and prosperity. These are resources that could immediately advance racial and gender equity and build an economy that works for every Alabamian.” ‒ Robyn Hyden, Executive Director, Alabama Arise
“The Medical Association of the State of Alabama commends the work of the Cover Alabama Coalition in its efforts to expand Medicaid. Without question, increasing access to quality care improves health outcomes for patients. While this obviously has a positive impact on individuals, the benefits also trickle up through families and communities, ultimately bettering our entire state.” ‒ Dr. John Meigs, Jr., President, Medical Association of the State of Alabama
“VOICES for Alabama’s Children supports the expansion of Medicaid in Alabama. As reported in the 2020 Alabama Kids Count Data Book, 96.7% of Alabama’s children are covered by some form of health insurance. National research across multiple states and multiple years shows that parents being insured significantly improves health outcomes for children, and expanding Medicaid would provide insurance for the over 340,000 currently uninsured Alabamians.” ‒ Stephen Woerner, Executive Director, VOICES for Alabama’s Children
“The Alabama Primary Health Care Association encourages the state’s leadership to avail itself of opportunities to increase access to health care for low-income individuals and families without insurance. Over 83% of the patients served by community health centers live in poverty; 45% lack insurance and face ongoing challenges receiving critical primary and preventive services necessary for healthier communities.” ‒ Lauren Gordon, Associate Director of Operations, Alabama Primary Health Care Association
“Given that heart disease remains the leading cause of death in Alabama, it is critical to extend access to care to those who need it most. The time to act is now, as expanding Medicaid will offer a lifeline to those who need it most and help Alabama emerge from the pandemic a stronger, healthier state.” ‒ Jada Shaffer, Government Relations Regional Director, American Heart Association
“More than 30,000 Alabamians will be diagnosed with cancer this year – and too many of them lack access to health coverage. Expanding Medicaid now would provide cancer patients the best chance to fight and survive this disease, as well as help ensure people have access to potentially lifesaving cancer screenings. With so many people losing their jobs and their health insurance, Medicaid can help ensure families across our state have access to affordable health coverage and can get the care they need to stay healthy.” ‒ Emily Ogden, Alabama Government Relations Director, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN)
“Access to health insurance is imperative for healthy children and healthy families. Medicaid expansion would allow for more families to be covered, which would improve all aspects of not only the parents’ lives, but also their children. Children First is urging Governor Ivey to utilize funds from the American Rescue Plan Act and expand Medicaid in Alabama.” ‒ Katie Jeter, Executive Director, Children First
“Expanding Medicaid would give the people in my communities a fighting chance to do more than just survive.” ‒ TC Caldwell, Arts & Communications Director, TKO Society
“Medicaid expansion is critically important to the health of Alabama, and the COVID-19 pandemic underscores the importance of health care access. For people with lung conditions, undergoing cancer treatment or living with other chronic diseases, Medicaid expansion will provide prevention, early detection and diagnostic services as well as disease management and treatment for their conditions, preventing costly emergency room visits. As a science-based patient advocate organization representing more than 800,000 people in Alabama with lung disease, the American Lung Association urges Alabama to expand Medicaid now.” ‒ Ashley Lyerly, Director of Advocacy, American Lung Association
“We need Medicaid expansion now. It’s a matter of saving lives.” ‒ Danny K. Patterson, Lighthouse Community Development Corporation
“In a state where much poverty exists and health insurance is difficult to afford, Medicaid expansion is an opportunity to ensure mental health care for uninsured individuals with a mental illness and to alleviate the cost burden on community providers and communities.” ‒ Don Schofield, President, Behavioral Health Care Alliance of Alabama
“Now is the time for Alabama to do the right thing and expand Medicaid. Over 300,000 Alabamians are trapped in the Medicaid coverage gap and are delaying preventative health care checkups because they lack health insurance. Additional compounding issues of lack of access, food deserts and growing mental, social and chronic concerns exacerbate health conditions because they do not have money or insurance to address those needs. Expanding Medicaid as soon as possible is essential to recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and putting Alabama on the right path.” ‒ Sheila Tyson, Alabama Black Women’s Roundtable
“The lack of previous Medicaid expansion was a huge factor in the closing of our only county hospital. Since that time, we’ve endured a pandemic without even basic health care available to all citizens of our county, despite many in our community providing such services at their own expense. Expanding Medicaid will also allow for the overwhelming majority of our citizens to have primary care services available. I am in a Black Belt county that has continued to see widened health care disparities through this pandemic. Despite many in our state leadership touting their hopes and dreams of adequate health care and health outcomes, they continue to shut the door on ‘the least of these.’ Alabama’s Medicaid system is far from perfect, but at least it might be a bridge to some basic services for our citizens.” ‒ Dr. Julia Boothe, Pickens County Primary Care, PC
“As a family nurse practitioner in a busy primary care practice for patients lacking insurance, I see the impact of the lack of expansion of Medicaid. I struggle to find resources for my patients who need various specialists such as a surgeon for a biopsy due to the patient’s lack of insurance. It is far past time for Alabama to do the right thing and expand Medicaid. Over 300,000 Alabamians are trapped in the Medicaid coverage gap and are delaying preventative health care checkups because they lack health insurance. By the time the patients arrive at the primary care clinic, they are complex patients who have multiple diagnoses due to the lack of care for years. If the patients had Medicaid, the patient would access care much earlier and possibly have prevented some of the health issues from even starting!” ‒ D’Ann Somerall, DNP, FNP-BC, FAANP, President of the Nurse Practitioner Alliance of Alabama
“Women want quality, affordable and culturally competent health care. Expanding Medicaid will provide greater access and improved maternal and other health outcomes for the women and families the YWCA serves, many of whom are in low-wage jobs that do not offer health insurance.” ‒ Dr. LaRhonda Magras, CEO, YWCA Central Alabama
“Medicaid is the nation’s primary health insurance program for people with disabilities, but it is so much more than health care. For individuals with disabilities and their families, Medicaid also funds vital supports to keep them in their communities. Here in Alabama, we have lengthy waiting lists for these vital services or are only able to provide limited supports to eligible people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Governor Ivey and legislative leaders need to take advantage of the federal money passed in the American Rescue Plan Act and quickly expand Medicaid so these waiting lists can be reduced.” ‒ Tim Cooper, Executive Director, The Arc of Alabama
“As a Huntsville business owner with experience in Washington and in Alabama, I have witnessed more deaths of clients with preventable diseases in Alabama with little access to affordable care than Washington with more affordability. We are living in a nightmare, because the things we need such as quality care and education, are out of reach and entirely underfunded and underprioritized. I know if only we had leaders who took their opinions out of legislation and our budget and listened to true stories of their own citizens who know what to do with their own money, this could have been prevented. We have one chance to do this right. Let it be known, the citizens of Alabama tried our damnedest.” ‒ Cortney Brown, Alabama Solutions, a Grassroots Movement
“Now is the time to expand Medicaid! Providing low-income Alabamians with health care coverage and getting them into primary and preventative care could save our state so much money. We would have a healthier and more productive workforce if we expanded Medicaid.” ‒ Angela M. Anderson, Alegna CDC
“Expanding Medicaid to the 300,000 Alabamians in the coverage gap is the morally right thing to do. It is also the fiscally responsible thing to do. Providing low-income Alabamians with health care coverage and preventative care will save lives and lead to better health outcomes for generations.” ‒ John E. Bouie, CEO, Greater Works Ministries
“Medicaid expansion is an opportunity not only to revitalize the quality of health care in every community, but to offer every elected leader a fresh and enduring legacy of true service and compassion.” ‒ Bill Fuller, Executive Director/ General Counsel, The Disabilities Leadership Coalition of Alabama (DLCA)
“Medicaid expansion would benefit individuals with asthma across the state.” ‒ Linda Gibson-Young, Alabama Asthma Coalition
“At least 300,000 Americans who reside in Alabama face health care challenges similar to developing world countries due to a lack of access to affordable medical care. Governor Ivey and our state legislative body must act now to expand Medicaid. President Biden’s signing of the American Rescue Plan Act funds an estimated $940 million that will directly impact health care options for the Medicaid-ineligible individuals and families currently caught in the Medicaid coverage gap.” ‒ Angela Curry, Executive Director, United Women of Color
“As a national leader in rural HIV treatment and prevention, we are excited that the tools exist to eradicate HIV within a generation, but we know that ending the epidemic depends on everyone having access to insurance coverage. It also depends on having a health care system to access. In recent years, rural Alabamians have seen our health care options rapidly eroding. Our state is one of the leading states for rural hospital closures, and all but four Alabama counties have been designated a Health Professional Shortage Area. Expanding Medicaid will not only extend life-saving health insurance to 300,000 of our neighbors, it will provide the economic engine to sustain essential health care services for us all – particularly those of us in rural communities. And it will bring our state one step closer to the national goal of ending HIV forever.” ‒ Michael Murphree, CEO, Medical Advocacy & Outreach
“Medicaid expansion will allow people with disabilities who are uninsured to access vital health care services. People with disabilities too often go without medical care because they lack health insurance. A majority of those who initially apply for Social Security disability benefits are denied. Those approved for SSDI must wait for two years to become eligible for Medicare. As a result, many are unable to access health care because they have no health insurance. Overwhelming medical debt leaves many with no alternative to bankruptcy and financial ruin. Medicaid expansion will go a long way to closing this gap in health care coverage while ensuring financial stability.” ‒ Dan Kessler, Executive Director, Disability Rights & Resources
“My sisters and brothers need Medicaid expansion, Governor Ivey!” ‒ Judith Taylor, The Sisters Tuscaloosa
“Alabama has some of the highest infant and maternal mortality rates in the United States. Over half of all births are covered by Medicaid, but these same mothers have no health coverage between pregnancies because we didn’t expand Medicaid. Thus, they enter pregnancy with untreated chronic illness, and babies and mothers die! If you care about families, if you want to improve our dismal maternal and infant health outcomes, you must expand Medicaid now.” ‒ Dalia Abrams, M.A., M.P.H., Executive Director of Program Operations, BirthWell Partners Community Doula Project
“Wings Across Alabama supports Medicaid expansion so all people can get the health care they deserve.” ‒ Thomson McCorkle, CPS, Executive Director, Wings Across Alabama
“It is essential that Governor Ivey takes the steps necessary to expand Medicaid today. Alabamians face overwhelming rates of poverty, chronic illness and racial health inequities. Representing about 40% of uninsured in the Medicaid expansion group, Black and Latino Alabamians continue to be locked out of preventive care, mental health services and chronic care management. These intertwined, long-standing inequities have led to devastating losses in our Black, Latino and immigrant communities during the ongoing pandemic. Our fight for health care is a fight for race equity.” ‒ Ana Delia Espino, Executive Director, Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice
“I urge our lawmakers to stand up for women and expand Medicaid to provide health care coverage for approximately 152,000 eligible women in Alabama. The time is now, federal money is available and Alabamians need not wait any longer. Additionally, a recent report by Alabama’s Maternal Mortality Review Committee revealed that 70% of the maternal deaths in Alabama were deemed preventable, and Medicaid expansion could reduce Alabama’s maternal deaths and change the narrative for women. A region, state or country’s ability to keep women and children alive during and after childbirth speaks volumes about our economic, social and political fabric.” ‒ Kim Cochran, Vice President, External Affairs, The Women’s Fund of Greater Birmingham
“Medicaid is a health lifeline for one in four Alabamians and an economic engine for communities across our state. As we struggle to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, expanding Medicaid coverage to adults with low incomes is the single biggest step Alabama can take to restore health, save our rural hospitals and boost economic recovery.” ‒ Jennifer S. Maddox, President and CEO, Community Foundation of Northeast Alabama
“Expanding Medicaid is a vital step forward in fulfilling the church’s mandate to care for ‘the least of these.’” ‒ James Williams, Chair, Church and Society Committee, Anniston First United Methodist Church
“The pandemic has laid bare the inequities of our health care systems and the fallacy of thinking you can protect some people while ignoring the most vulnerable amongst us. Medicaid expansion is most obviously the right move for Alabama.” ‒ Tobey Miller, Progressive Women of Northeast Alabama
“Zonta Club of Birmingham urges Alabama’s governor and Legislature to act speedily to take advantage of newly available federal dollars to expand Medicaid to address long-standing gaps in health care availability and financial strains affecting our health care system. As an organization focused on the well-being of women, we are deeply concerned about the lack of access to adequate, affordable health care for far too many Alabama women and tragic health outcomes such as Alabama’s high maternal mortality rate. It is estimated that the expansion of Medicaid would allow over 150,000 Alabama women to have health insurance. This immediate opportunity must not be missed.” ‒ Susan Sheppard and Alison Smith, Zonta Club of Birmingham (a member of Zonta International, Inc.)
“I believe this pandemic has taught us something about health care which so many of us have known for a long time. Rural hospitals have closed in areas where many poor people live. These people have life threatening diseases and many have died of COVID-19 because they could not afford to even go to a doctor or there was no doctor in the area. We as Christian people should be taking care of the sick and poor as Jesus told us to do. So let us now take the great opportunity we have to expand Medicaid.” ‒ Peggy Cunningham, Baypines District United Methodist Women
“Even before the pandemic, too many Alabamians were suffering due to inadequate health care because they were uninsured. This is a moral issue. We strongly support the expansion of Medicaid. It will save lives.” ‒ Rev. Carolyn Foster, Tri-Chair, Alabama Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival
“Medicaid expansion is imperative to help us achieve health equity and reduce disease burden in our state.” ‒ Jessie Schwiesow, Unity Wellness Center
“The League of Women Voters of Alabama supports access to basic health care services for all Alabama citizens. With the expansion of Medicaid in Alabama, there will be fewer persons falling through the cracks in our system of health care delivery. Medicaid expansion will provide more funding for all hospitals and clinics, especially those in rural and underserved communities.” ‒ Barbara Caddell, President, League of Women Voters of Alabama
“There are more than 7,000 rare diseases affecting about 30 million Americans; and more than 400,000 are Alabamians. Many of these individuals depend on Medicaid for primary or supplemental health coverage. In addition to this, people are losing their incomes and health coverage because of COVID and other health care crises. Expanding Medicaid could remove the coverage gaps that’s leaving many without an affordable health coverage option. It’s ‒ literally ‒ a matter of life and death.” ‒ Sarita Edwards, CEO, President, E.WE Foundation
“It is far past time for Alabama to do the right thing and expand Medicaid. Over 300,000 Alabamians are trapped in the Medicaid coverage gap and are delaying preventative health care check-ups because they lack health insurance. Expanding Medicaid as soon as possible is essential to recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and putting Alabama on the right path.” ‒ Dan Pile, YMCA of Greater Birmingham
“Countless hard-working Alabamians are unable to get the health care they have always needed, and particularly need now in the throes of a pandemic. Hospitals and clinics in the poorest and most underserved parts of our state, particularly in the Black Belt, have been forced to close for lack of funds. These dire conditions exist in the wealthiest country in the world despite health care being a universally recognized human right. It is disgraceful that the U.S. does not recognize it as a human right and even more disgraceful that Alabama has not yet expanded Medicaid. Doing so would be a vital and long-overdue benefit to the entire state, and especially to our most vulnerable citizens.” ‒ David Gespass, Co-Chair, Alabama Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild
Media Release/Jane Adams
Campaign Director | Cover Alabama Coalition
