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Tallahassee, FL – Florida Medicaid would be drastically revamped over the next five years, with nearly all patients receiving managed care from private companies, under legislation proposed late Tuesday in the state House of Representatives. Margie Menzel reports.
The House Select Policy Council on Strategic and Economic Planning offered two bills aimed at reducing the soaring cost of the state-federal health care program for low-income and disabled patients...and predicting savings from 2 percent to as much as 15 percent. But hospitals, physicians and other providers warned that the plan would reduce access to care. Miguel Machado of the Florida Medical Association:
"Not only will we have to accept Medicaid rates, which are 56 percent of Medicare and makes it impossible to keep our doors open," said Machado, "but now, we will have to deal with a third party that we don't want to have to deal with."
The Senate has already passed a measure that would add 19 more counties and a quarter of a million Floridians to the managed care experiment. The House would extend managed care to nearly all Medicaid recipients over the next five years, starting with Miami-Dade County.