Opinion

Editorial: Burr and Tillis need to lead so 256,650 N.C. kids keep health coverage

Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2017 -- Congress failed to renew the Children's Health Insurance Program. It provides health care for 256,650 N.C. children in working families where incomes are above the level to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to afford private or employer-based insurance. It is unfair and wrong to make children pawns in pointless political game. It is another case study in governmental dysfunction as political leaders can't even pass what they agree on.

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CBC Editorial: Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2017; Editorial # 8218
The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company
While the U.S. Senate was preoccupied with its bumbling efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Healthcare Act, Congress left the health care of 9 million children – 256,650 of them in North Carolina – in jeopardy.

We should not be surprised. North Carolina’s two senators, Richard Burr and Thom Tillis, were on the obstinate and failing side of the latest effort to repeal Obamacare. That proposal would take health coverage away from 20 million Americans. While it never made it to a vote, both Burr and Tillis remarkably supported the measure. That fact should not be forgotten.

Authorization for the Children’s Health Insurance Program – N.C. Health Choice in this state – expired Sept. 30. Congress failed to renew it even though it has bipartisan support. The program provides health care for children in working families where incomes are above the level to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to afford private or employer-based insurance.

It is unfair and wrong to make the health care of children – or anyone for that matter -- a pawn in a pointless political game in Washington.

It is another case study in governmental dysfunction as political leaders can’t even pass what they agree on.

In North Carolina, the federal government picks up 99.8 percent of the program’s cost -- $467.6 million annually. Given the flow of federal dollars, the program here might continue to March without any action by Congress or the state legislature.

Still, little is certain other than the health care of nearly a quarter-million North Carolina children is at risk. There’s the slight possibility that up to 57 percent of those kids may be able to shift to Medicaid coverage. Still, at least 110,855 children, through no fault of their own, will lose their health care coverage unless the program is renewed.

The program has been a major driver in expanding health care to more North Carolina children, who otherwise would have to go without it. Since 2009, the rate of uninsured children has dropped by nearly half – among the steepest declines in the nation.

What is accomplished by refusing to reauthorize this program? Is there a vote to be gained? Is there a political point to be scored? There’s no win in denying health care to kids who need it most.

Burr and Tillis now have an opportunity to do the right thing. They should take the lead to reauthorize the Children’s Health Insurance Program as quickly as possible.

A few weeks ago key U.S. Senate negotiators Orrin Hatch, R-Utah and Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, indicated that agreement had been reached to extend the children’s health program five years – a much-needed improvement to avoid the chaos of the short-term authorizations. But the Graham-Cassidy bill to repeal Obamacare derailed the effort.

We’d like to feel our elected leaders earn our respect. But how is that possible when they’re unable to move forward with the things they agree on? They could do it by getting this program back on track.

It is not an acceptable excuse to say the politics of repealing Obamacare got in the way of making sure children receive the health care they need. Burr and Tillis have played around enough with the politics of health care.

They need to do their jobs, now, and lead the effort to pass reauthorization of the Children’s Health Insurance program.

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