54k Mississippians Lack Access to Private Health Insurance, Even With Subsidies

Although Mississippi saved its endangered Medicaid program in a special session budget vote last week, many low-income residents who don’t qualify for Medicaid will not be able to receive health insurance subsidies through the state exchange, as no private insurers have offered plans to cover 36 of the state’s 82 counties, according to a report by Kaiser Health News.

As many as 54,000 Mississippians would be unable to apply the federal subsidies for health insurance for which they qualify because there are no applicable health plans.

HHS has allowed Mississippi to extend the deadline for insurers to submit plans to sell on the state’s online marketplace, which open for enrollment Oct. 1, but J. Stansel Harvey, CEO of Delta Regional Medical Center in Greenville, Miss., told KHN that the impoverished areas’ scarcity of physicians and hospitals make the challenge of tailoring networks and plans especially burdensome for health insurers.

54k Mississippians Lack Access to Private Health Insurance, Even With Subsidies

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