The expansion of medical coverage for Americans under the provisions of the Affordable Care Act entails the increase of insurance rates and the improvement of overall public health due to the extended coverage. However, not all of the states have implemented this change to the healthcare legislation, which restricts their economic and healthcare system benefits in the short- and long-term perspectives. In particular, the state of Texas is one of those that have not yet implemented the Medicaid expansion decisions. This paper demonstrates that the state’s medical sphere is characterized by higher costs of treatment and uninsured populations than states where expansion has been implemented.
Texas has not implemented Medicaid expansion yet, which has implications for the healthcare and economic spheres. In particular, the decision not to expand Medicaid has impacted Texas’ healthcare system in a manner that limits its opportunities to minimize treatment costs. Indeed, as found by Saygili (2022), states with Medicaid expansion have 4.71% lower costs of treatment than Texas. Furthermore, since Texas shares borders with several states, patients from those states obtain services in Texas hospitals, which exposes the population of other states to the disadvantages of non-expanded Medicaid coverage. Moreover, the limited access of particular populations to Medicaid insurance has adverse long-term impacts on the public health of the citizens.
Thus, when tackling the question of whether to expand or not, the states take different positions, which in the case of Texas, demonstrates the lack of willingness of the state authorities to do so. However, the negative manifestations of the lack of expansion, such as low insurance rates and high treatment costs, demonstrate the risks for people that might be avoided. Therefore, Texas should expand its Medicaid coverage to benefit from the program.
Reference
Saygili, M. (2022). How would Medicaid expansion affect Texas hospitals? Evidence from a retrospective quasi-experimental study. INQUIRY: The Journal of Health Care Organization, Provision, and Financing, 59, 1-8.