Alison Barkoff, George Washington University:
Medicaid is the primary funder of home and community-based services. Those are the services that allow people with disabilities to live in their own homes, to get out of bed, to shower, to cook, to go out and participate in the community.
And these services are critical. They are optional for states to provide. And currently we have 700,000 people sitting on waiting lists. When we start hearing about cuts of the magnitude of $880 billion, what’s really important to remember is cuts to state Medicaid programs will necessitate cutting optional programs, the first thing to go.
And my colleagues and I have just published a paper looking at this. Every time there are budget shortfalls in states, even if states don’t want to impact people with disabilities and older adults, they have no choice but to cut optional programs like home and community-based services.
