A bill in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives would impose work requirements and a lifetime limit of five years for eligibility to the state's Medicaid program, reports the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
"We have a finite amount of taxpayer dollars," said Rep. Seth Grove, R, who sponsored House Bill 1407, according to the report. "We need to make sure they go to the most needy individuals." Mr. Grove said the proposed bill would only apply to able-bodied adults.
Currently, almost $1 out of every $4 in the commonwealth's annual budget goes toward Medicaid, according to the report. Medicaid is Pennsylvania's second highest expenditure after education.
However, it's unlikely the bill will become law under Pennsylvania's current Democratic governor, Tom Wolf, who said he doesn't support the bill. A statement from Mr. Wolf's office said the proposed legislation would "reverse progress we've made on improving overall health outcomes and drive people further into poverty," according to the report. "Policies that arbitrarily limit the amount of time an individual can receive Medicaid move away from the core mission of the program, which is to improve outcomes and the overall experience of care, improve population health, and reduce health care costs through improvement."
More than 2.8 million residents of Pennsylvania receive Medicaid benefits, though many beneficiaries are children, the elderly or disabled, according to state data cited by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.