Deadline on Kids' Health Money Passes
Deadline on Kids' Health Money Passes
$1.1 Billion Targeted for Low-Income Children's Program Goes Unspent
Oct. 1, 2004 -- The deadline ran out last night on more than $1 billion in federal money slated for children's health, forcing the cash to revert to the U.S. Treasury instead of going for low-income programs.
Congress failed to act to keep $1.1 billion targeted for the State Children's Health Insurance Plan, or SCHIP. The program provides health coverage for approximately 6 million U.S. children from families living at 200% of the federal poverty level.
The move incensed some lawmakers who lobbied for a measure that would send the money to poorer states facing shortfalls in the program. But a lack of agreement on whether the money is best spent in those states versus using it to expand enrollment to cover more uninsured children meant that the funds were no longer available to states after midnight on Sept. 30.
Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W. Va.) says that 200,000 children in seven states would lose out on health coverage without the extra money.
"These children and their families were depending on us in Congress, and we've let them down," he says in a statement.
Republican congressional leaders and the Bush administration opposed a reshuffling of the money. They argue that overall, states are projected to spend only about half of $11 billion available to them for children's health programs in the 2005 fiscal year, which starts today.
Officials from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services also said that it would use its authority to send $660 million of money left over from 2002 accounts to states with funding gaps.
"No state will be left short and no child will lose coverage due to a shortfall, period," says HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson.
The Bush administration wants to spend this year's left over money on outreach programs to expand SCHIP enrollment, Thompson wrote in a letter to lawmakers. Approximately 5 million U.S. children eligible for SCHIP are not enrolled, according to federal figures.
Rockefeller and a bipartisan group of senators announced that they will continue attempts to force Congress to send the $1.1 billion to states before lawmakers reach a scheduled adjournment in mid-October.
Deadline on Kids' Health Money Passes
$1.1 Billion Targeted for Low-Income Children's Program Goes Unspent
Oct. 1, 2004 -- The deadline ran out last night on more than $1 billion in federal money slated for children's health, forcing the cash to revert to the U.S. Treasury instead of going for low-income programs.
Congress failed to act to keep $1.1 billion targeted for the State Children's Health Insurance Plan, or SCHIP. The program provides health coverage for approximately 6 million U.S. children from families living at 200% of the federal poverty level.
The move incensed some lawmakers who lobbied for a measure that would send the money to poorer states facing shortfalls in the program. But a lack of agreement on whether the money is best spent in those states versus using it to expand enrollment to cover more uninsured children meant that the funds were no longer available to states after midnight on Sept. 30.
Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W. Va.) says that 200,000 children in seven states would lose out on health coverage without the extra money.
"These children and their families were depending on us in Congress, and we've let them down," he says in a statement.
Republican congressional leaders and the Bush administration opposed a reshuffling of the money. They argue that overall, states are projected to spend only about half of $11 billion available to them for children's health programs in the 2005 fiscal year, which starts today.
Officials from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services also said that it would use its authority to send $660 million of money left over from 2002 accounts to states with funding gaps.
"No state will be left short and no child will lose coverage due to a shortfall, period," says HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson.
The Bush administration wants to spend this year's left over money on outreach programs to expand SCHIP enrollment, Thompson wrote in a letter to lawmakers. Approximately 5 million U.S. children eligible for SCHIP are not enrolled, according to federal figures.
Rockefeller and a bipartisan group of senators announced that they will continue attempts to force Congress to send the $1.1 billion to states before lawmakers reach a scheduled adjournment in mid-October.