Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Rendell Continues Push for "Cover All Pennsylvanians"

By Nathan Benefield

Categories: California, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania

In his budget address, Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, continued his push for "Cover All Pennsylvanians" despite bad news on three state health care proposals fundamentally similar to RendellCare:

In California legislators overwhelming rejected Arnold Schwarzenegger’s $15 billion health care proposal.
An analysis of Dirigo Care in Maine finds that most of the few signing up were previously covered in private insurance.
And in Massachusetts, costs are dramatically exceding expectations, and the Connector Authority is addressing the problem by capping premiums, cutting reimbursements to providers, and reducing consumer choices.

A few weeks ago, the Commonwealth Foundation put out some quick facts about the few Pennsylvanians that would be covered by "Cover All Pennsylvanians." Based on the new Governor's budget, we have had to revise that estimate (PDF version).

CAP will actually cover fewer Pennsylvanians than we said it would. Even taking away some basic assumptions - that there would be any increase in uninsured or any "crowd out," Governor Rendell's own numbers indicate only about 200,000 would use CAP. This represents one-quarter of the estimate uninsured. Click here for chart.