Advocates continue fight for Medicaid expansion despite election setback
Public News Service
Suzanne Potter
Health-care advocates are vowing to continue their fight to expand Medicaid in Kansas – despite this week’s election, which expanded the Republican supermajority.
Gov. Laura Kelly, D-Kansas, supports expanding the program to more low-income families under the Affordable Care Act – but conservative lawmakers passed a law forbidding the move.
April Holman, executive director of the Alliance for a Healthy Kansas, is among those calling for change.
“I think the bottom line is we have really been focused on building a grassroots movement that is too large and too loud for policymakers to ignore, and that’s what we’re going to continue to do, even with the most recent election results,” she said.
Data from the Kansas Department of Public Health shows a maternal mortality rate of 11 deaths per every 100,000 live births. The agency found 13 maternal deaths from 2016 to 2018 and found all but one were preventable. And two-thirds of mothers were racial and ethnic minorities.
Holman noted that more than 14% of babies born to Black mothers in Kansas have low birth weights, and Black mothers are 200% more likely to have a low-birthweight baby.
“We think that in part that has to do with access to affordable health care, not only later in their pregnancy but also at the beginning and even pre-pregnancy,” Holman continued.
The Kansas Health Institute estimates that almost 152,000 Kansans – including more than 45,000 children – would enroll in KanCare if Medicaid were to be expanded.